Betwixt Heaven and Hell
by Cy.ra.no.Lee
Summary: It started with the glint in his eyes. The strange women appearing beside him- as enemies more than friends. The signs were there. Naruto was turning back into what he was always meant to be. It is not human.
1. Prologue Part One

**Shukaku**

* * *

Tenju, Hisaishi had been assigned a mission that he didn't want to take. He was going to go through with it, because he didn't want to get killed, but he still resented it. Since the beast had become the Kazekage, people had been working harder to fulfill their missions to the fullest. His lead had been amicable thus far, but people were fearful. The new Kazekage was a spontaneous one, who would kill at the drop of the hat. He had killed when he fancied it, even as a small child.

Not one person in Suna really knew why the red head had been put to the task of leading them. He had an older brother and sister, who seemed much more mentally stable and capable of taking care of the village. Yet he had still been placed as the head. No one could have foreseen such things, and now they couldn't revoke it. Not without fear that the red head would kill them all. So it was that Tenju, Hisaishi had been given the task of patrolling the outer border of Suna with another nin. It was a boring, tedious job, and he would much rather do _anything_ else than that. It wasn't that he was complaining about his job overall. However, he thought that watching the sand for nothing but sandstorms, sand dunes, and tumbleweeds in the blazing sun was overbearingly monotonous.

Tenju kicked the dirt, frustrated with the lack of life in the desert. His foot caught on something peculiarly heavy, and he froze. He had seen the giant scarab beetles that liked to scuttle around the desert and suck away their water supplies. If this was what he had been sent out for, he thoroughly regretted his disdain for the job. He wasn't ready to take on these beetles by himself, and he knew that he wasn't. The only person he had ever seen take one of these on alone was the Kazekage. Tenju shivered. It had been easy for the red head, but gruesome to them nonetheless. Now that he remembered, why had the Kazekage been out there anyway? All that he could really recall was the beetle being a great hassle, even with three capable nin battling it...

With that thought, Tenju realized that he had been standing still for so long that if it was _really_ a scarab beetle, he would be dead by now. So it wasn't a beetle and he really needed to stop thinking about such idle things when he was on a mission. What was it? There was great cause for Tenju to dig beneath the dirt and figure it out, and then there was cause not to. It could be a trap, set for a ninja like himself to be caught up in. Or it could be something else, something... worthy. Weighing his options, Tenju figured he was capable enough to get himself out of a trap, and that if he did fall for it, he deserved it for being an incompetent nin. He crouched down, legs tensed and ready to spring away, or kick and fight if he had to. His hands began to dig at the sand, and not too far down, a blonde spike poked up.

Tenju had never seen anything like it, save Temari-donno's spiky pig tails. At least he was certain that it was hair. He prayed to himself that it wasn't a bandit. What with it being so hot, he really didn't have the energy to kill anyone. He dug farther and wrinkled his nose as unappealing black and orange came into view as more of the boy's body was uncovered. Didn't this kid know that he was a walking target? Shaking his head, Tenju checked for a pulse, than a sign of recognition. The kid's headband told him that he was from Konohagakure, but that was about it.

He supposed that since they had been allies for a consecutive year now, that he could bring the boy in. It didn't mean he wasn't still wary.

 _ **...**_

His teal eyes flicked up from the work across his desk and narrowed. Tenju, Hisaishi had the job of patrolling the outer barrier of Suna. He was now cowering in his ninja garb because of something that had come out of his own mouth. Gaara figured he would be. Most people cowered when he narrowed his eyes, but it was his only way to focus on one thought in the mass of all of his other ones. Someone from Konoha had been brought here. Of course, the nin had decided to tell him, because Gaara would have to be the one who would deal with all political aspects of the matter.

If it was seen that someone from Konoha had been taken in by Suna and had not been shown care then the ever fragile alliance between the two would break. It could also be someone who was an imposter, and would be dealt with swiftly and efficiently. Gaara was not a careless leader and now had purpose for everything he did.

"You brought him to the hospital for care," the red head said, expecting to see nothing but the best common sense come from one of his own. The raven haired man nodded and continued to stare at Gaara. He didn't want to be the one who broke eye contact first, especially if Gaara himself had not allowed it. He sighed out silently as the red head blinked down at the work in front of his desk.

"Continue with your assignment."

Hisiashi turned so fast that he felt sort of dizzy. Every instinct in his body told him that he should run out of there and save his own life. He decided against it on the basis that he might die in some strange form of karma.

"Thank you."

Tenju closed the door softly behind him. Gaara sighed to himself. He had been very courteous as the new Kazekage. He was being courteous as a human being, even with the creature inside of him to see if he could be his own person.

 **You can't survive without me, runt.**

Gaara couldn't say otherwise, but he knew that he could care for himself, if he were free. He also knew that deep inside, he wanted the people of Suna to treat him as Naruto did. Like they had something to teach him, and even if they wouldn't hold his hand all the way through it, he knew that they would be there to correct him.

 **Hahaha! You wouldn't know a thing without me.**

The red head ignored the voice and stepped out from behind the desk to go meet the new visitor. He wondered what the possibility of it being someone he knew was.

 **I want a rematch with the fox brat!**

Gaara closed the door to his office behind himself.

…

Son... of a _bitch._ _'_

Everything stung, and he meant _everything._ Naruto wondered how he could have gotten sand in _those places,_ but the urge to forget was much greater. He had never been thrown into a sandstorm so suddenly, and was disappointed with himself for not paying closer attention for warning signs. However, he grinned at the dark thought that the other nin had been caught in the sandstorm and had been sanded to shreds. He sat up and hissed as he felt the sting ripple down his body.

"Don't try to sit up."

Naruto's eyes flicked to Gaara, who was leaning against the door with his arms folded. The blonde merely turned and let his eyes roam the room. He then proceeded to reach over (all the while pretending that it didn't hurt) and grab a glass of water off the dresser. He drank the whole pitcher. When he was done, he looked back at Gaara. His nurse was cowering in the corner, and there were two nin behind the red head who looked like they were only there out of obligation. He snorted internally. There would never be equality between people and the jinchuuriki.

"Nice to see you too, Browless," he said with a clear throat. A smile blanketed over his face, eyes closing so that the red head couldn't see how much he didn't mean it. The nin behind Gaara froze, and the woman in the corner let out a stifled gasp, and trembled harder. Naruto wasn't afraid of the red head. He could beat him if he wanted to, but he didn't really want to. He wasn't there to start a fight at all. Well, he wasn't supposed to be there in the first place, but he supposed he was grateful that he had been saved. He watched as the red head raised his hand in trepidation. His head snapped back and into the pillow as he felt a sharp sting. Naruto could feel the grains of sand underneath his skin, like a shiver that crawled over him as he fell and scraped his elbow. He grit his teeth.

After a few seconds, a cloud of bloody sand crept from under his bandages and floated in the air. He sighed in relief as he turned his back to the red head for a few seconds.

"Thanks," the blonde finally said, and then proceeded to set up over the edge of the bed. Gaara looked blankly at him, wondering whether the idiot wanted himself to bleed out and die, or never to heal properly at all. He blinked.

"What are you doing in Kaze no Tori," he asked instead, wanting to make sense of things. As soon as he said it, darkness cascaded over the blonde's face. His eyes slid away from Gaara's profile and lowered so that his eyelashes were highlighted by ocean blue. He leaned his head on his hand, and a warped, abhorrent smile slid across his face. The sun was blocked momentarily by a very random, almost impossible cloud.

The shadows of the blonde's face grew deep and cold, and screamed of something that would die or had died already. Then it faded, and his eyes slid back to the red head's. Gaara noticed that they had a strange emptiness to them. He hoped above everything that it wasn't still the effect of Sasuke's abandonment. It made a strange rage bubble up inside of him.

"I lost Jiraiya somewhere. He'll know where I am, eventually," he said, leaning back on his hands as they slid through the white sheets on his bed. Gaara studied him warily. That was not the answer to the question he had asked, but it did suffice for the next question he had about why he was alone. Naruto watched the red head for a few more minutes before leaning forward and placing his elbows on his knees.

"I thought this was the safest place I could go, without returning to Konoha," he said, staring directly into Gaara's eyes to show that he meant the truth. The red head stared back, and when something inside him said it was too much, he turned away.

"Fine. You will stay here and recuperate. I will try to get in touch with Konoha," the red head replied, waving his hand and dispersing the sand he had taken from underneath the blonde's skin. Naruto frowned and turned his head to the window. There was an essence on his lips of something dark. It was much darker than what he knew he would say next.

"Why? I'm not done with my journey yet."

"Returning there to wait for Jiraiya-sennin will only put a pause in your quest."

"I don't want to pause," Naruto said calmly, but there was something howling in his voice. It was as if the wind had shattered and spoken a threat so softly that the birds and the bees became silent, and the flowers gasped in trepidation. Gaara did not move his gaze from blonde locks.

"I can train here, much harder than I could there," he said, closing his eyes in what seemed nostalgia. He fell silent, his eyes not portraying the tsunami he held within his body. Gaara narrowed his eyes at the blonde. He was acting very strangely from when the red head had met him before. Needing time to ponder about this new turn in the blonde, he turned, completely dropping the conversation and leaving future plans for Naruto unattended. He didn't mind, however. As his thoughts darkened into the norm, he turned his clear oceanic gaze to the nurse who still coward in the corner.

"Don't come back to this room. I won't be here," he said. The nurse looked quizzically at him, but said nothing in favor of fleeing. Naruto turned back to the window, feeling his injuries heal up. He would be okay in another hour. But he didn't wait that long to remove the useless bandages on his body, get dressed, and hop out of the window into the blistering heat of Suna.

 _ **~{heaven}~**_

He breathed in the air that overlooked Suna. It was dusty but there was a freshness there that whispered thoughts about a beach. It felt so calming and new and he needed change. Naruto looked out over Suna, negativity fuming out of him. He couldn't stay here. Jiraiya had not only been teaching him life lessons, but brought him on miscellaneous missions as well. Even though Naruto pretended to berk the harder missions up a bit, he knew how they worked. He knew how to finish them with precision rivaled only by the top jounin in Konoha, or maybe even better.

Now that he was actually thinking about it, he was pissed that he had lost the old man. He had no time to waste, and this had just set him back. It reminded him of those days. His eyes became distant as he realized that his past had become a separate dimension to him. It was separated by some very cursory events that Naruto would never tell to anyone who didn't know. If he did, it would be like taking a butterfly and setting it free in a different dimension. Even the softest beat of wings would become supersonic catastrophy in time.

"Go back to the hospital," he heard from behind him. He ignored it in favor of leaning back to lie and look at the sky. He felt very serene up here, and he wished this life weren't his own for the first time since he had been living it.

"Have you every wished you were someone else?"

To Gaara, this was not such a strange question in it's nature. The intent _did_ stagger him, and very thoroughly. He was not friends with the blonde, though they had come to a well enough acquaintance with one another. He just did not expect something like that, especially not from the blonde. He always seemed happy to be himself, and if not, then he would never complain.

"It would serve no purpose to wish for things."

Naruto snorted petulantly, then stood. His wounds had healed now, and he had a little fun in his head thinking of how hard it must have been for the Sunites to search for him. They must have been terrified at the prospect of having another monster in the village. It made his blood boil for Gaara. They weren't monsters. They had never done anything to hurt people from their own homeland. They were humans, fated evilly to be the containers for beast that had ruined everything.

"But you did wish. You wished to become Kazekage, someday," Naruto said, looking up at Gaara. Their eyes connected, and the redhead took note of the fresh color of the blonde's eyes. They were not a solid blue, but had flecks of green and silver in them. He grunted and turned away. He had not wished to become Kazekage. He had made it a necessity.

"This will be my home away from home," Naruto said absentmindedly. Gaara watched the blonde's face with narrowed eyes. It sounded as if the blonde intended to stay, and if not, then he would be back to visit often. The red head knew not how to approach this. The blonde's visits could turn his village into a nightmare, or help it heal in a way that he had never seen before.

 _ **~{hell]~**_

"It's just going to be a hassle watching him," Kankuro snorted. Temari scowled at him.

"Don't complain about your job, just do it," she replied, turning away and flicking her hand at him. As she walked away, Kankuro called, "Why? Should be afraid of them too?"

Temari froze and then turned back to face him. Her blue eyes pierced his, speaking millions of things and nothing at all. She said, "That's your choice."

She walked away, leaving Kankuro to finish his meal in silence. He couldn't very well say that the silence was welcomed either. It left him to contemplate, and he so hated things like that. When he was alone, his thoughts overrode him. It was especially hard this time because of what Temari had just left him with.

 _That's your choice._

It pissed him off. Everyone in the village was afraid of Gaara. Adding Naruto to the mix wasn't going to help with anything. The blonde was loud and obnoxious, and people were either going to pale in fear of him, or try to kill him. People had tried to kill Gaara in broad daylight, and he was now warranted bodyguards. Kankuro was the same for Naruto, but it seemed that this decision had been made carelessly. Nothing would do if it was only him guarding the blonde. Not only that, but if something happened, Kankuro wasn't going to stick around to catch the blame.

He sighed as he stood up and put his dishes in the sink. He was supposed to be going so that he could find the blonde dumb ass. It was annoying enough that he was here, but having to go wherever he went and constantly watch his back while he rambled on about nonsense was not going to help.

There was a knock at the door, and Kakuro's head snapped up. Confusion overtook him, and he went to open it. There stood Naruto, bright hair shining, though it was slightly damp and not flying out in every direction. His blue eyes looked directly up into Kankuro's. The brunette couldn't believe how tall the blonde had gotten, and he figured that he had not finished growing yet either. He mentally shook his head.

"What are you doing here, gaki," he asked, voiced portraying his miffed attitude already. Naruto continued to stare at him. After thirty seconds, Kankro grew worried and slightly fearful. The blonde hadn't blinked, hadn't moved, hadn't _breathed_. Kankuro wondered if he was sucking his soul out using his eyes. Finally, after a full minute had passed, Naruto averted his eyes to the doorjamb. Kankuro let an uncouth breath of air out that he didn't know he had been holding. Trying to suck out his soul. He snorted and turned his eyes away.

"I've been assigned to you."

"Huh," Kankuro grunted without eloquence. Naruto stepped silently into his house and sat at his kitchen table. Confused, Kankuro slowly closed the door.

"I've been assigned to you," Naruto said, his slow speed changed to thoughtfulness, "and I need new clothes."

Kankuro snorted as he thought the statement over. He said, "Well, that's obvious... You've been assigned..?"

"Yes. Just like your other jinchuuriki," he said, pointedly ignoring the wince that Kankuro gave, "Now, you're my babysitter."

"Listen, gaki, I don't babysit anybody!"

"Good," Naruto said, smirk plastering over his face as he pushed his chair out. He turned and walked back to Kankuro. He bowed rigidly, though if the brunette thought about it, his body flowed into the position. He narrowed his eyes.

"I don't think I need to have a babysitter," he said as he slid back into his straight stance. Ignoring the shiver at the dark voice that almost accused him, he glared at the blonde.

"Oh no you don't! I was assigned to watch you, and you're not getting out of it that easily," he said. Naruto's face slipped into a blonde mask, and he began watching Kankuro's eyes once again. After fifteen seconds, the brunette tore his gaze away.

"I don't need to be watched. You can follow me, just to say that you did a good job, but nothing will come of it," the blonde said, sliding past him and towards the door. Kankuro grabbed his arm and spun him around. The brunette stood there glaring harshly at him. The look of blank intensity in Naruto's eyes fought it, promising secrets that even Kankuro could not breach. Should not.

"We don't have to make this any harder than it has to be," he said through clenched teeth. Naruto stayed unmoving in his grasp, eyes boring into his steadily. Kankuro wasn't so sure about his previous statement. The blonde gave a quick jerk, throwing the brunette off balance and releasing himself from his grip. He turned and left. Kankuro huffed and followed him out, locking his door on the way.

He trailed behind Naruto a few feet, watching as people took glances at them and talked. The blonde seemed unfazed by it all. Kankuro would guess that the blonde's own village treated him the same way. It was different to watch from this point of view. This was an angle that was very off scale. Instead of being one of these people, or being the 'disconnected brother,' he was looking in from the point of view of the guard of a similar stranger. It took him into a new element, and he supposed that was the roll of a ninja.

A familiar store catching the periphery of his sight, he called out to Naruto. Though the blonde stopped immediately, it took him a second to turn around. When he did, Kankuro could see blown, dark eyes of the boy. He couldn't continue looking, and so he turned his head to the store. It was frightening, he thought, to see someone with such a vibrant personality become someone who he didn't know.

"The clothing store is there," he said. Naruto's eyes flicked over to it. He knew he needed clothes, but that wasn't the store he wanted to get them from.

"Not that one," he said, turning away and increasing the pace on his trek. Floored by the blonde's abrupt rejection, Kankuro followed. He was already annoyed as it was. Naruto was not helping the fray. The longer he followed, the darker his scowl became. People began backing away in fear of him, and some looked between the two of them, clearly noticing that the brunette was following the newcomer. Naruto seemed to stop thoughtfully at one store, peering at it with a different kind of intensity he had showed Kankuro. Then he turned into it and left the brunette staring wearily after him.

Naruto could handle himself inside a store, he thought absently. Though, he had to admit, the store looked ultimately dreadful and he didn't know what kind of things were in it. It's windows were blacked out, and it had a very suspicious looking sign hanging above it. He shifted in his spot, wondering whether he should go in or not. He shook his head, missing the passerby who looked at him oddly.

His worry mounted and swirled unnecessarily until the blonde stepped out of the store, bags in hand. Kankuro's eye twitched.

 _ **~{heaven}~**_

Gaara didn't understand why it bothered him so much. Well, more importantly, he didn't understand why the blonde would do it. For two days straight, Kankuro had been in a twist about the blonde. He would either rant loudly about him, or curse neatly under his breath. Though the latter was easier on the red head's fraying nerves, he still couldn't say it didn't bother him. He wanted his brother gone. He was interfering with his concentration. It was hard enough with that _thing_ inside of him talking. Usually, Gaara's energy went to silencing it, especially when he important business to take care of.

 **You ain't doing be a favor by holding me here brat. Why don't you let me out for a bit?**

Now, it seemed the blonde was causing more trouble than he was worth, and he had only been here a short while. Gaara had not even _seen_ him again since finding him a place to stay in the Kazekage's compound. It would have been much easier to set him up somewhere else. However, having guards for the blonde would be much easier if the ones protecting him were assigned a double responsibility. When he had the time, Gaara wondered if his subordinates were annoyed with him heaping work on them. He didn't dare think twice about it; they were ninja, and they had jobs to do. They could not complain, even if their leader was a freak.

 **Hey!? Who's the freak here!?**

Gaara held in his wince as someone knocked on the door. Kankuro stepped in, face sullen, eyes prepared. The red head sat stock still. Had he had any contact with other people in his earlier age, he would have raised his eyebrow in question.

"Naruto is in the training arena," the brunette grumbled. Gaara did not know if he expected this to be any sort of explanation. The red head was conflicted, though he shouldn't be, about what to do with it. He didn't know how to _deal_ with this, even though he had several years of experience living through it.

"No one can use the grounds while he's there."

A little angry jolt passed through Gaara, and he pressed his lips together as his face drew in on itself sternly. He said, "No one wants to use it while a jiinchuuriki is there."

Kankuro looked away from him, arms folded. He had not wanted to phrase it that way. Maybe, he had phrased it even more terribly.

"They will not train, if they cannot overcome themselves," Gaara said, as if that were the end of the conversation. Kankuro looked at him now, anger boiling under his skin. He had had _enough_ of Naruto over the last few days, and he wasn't going to do something this time. _NO._ It was Gaara's turn whether he liked it or not. He slammed his hands down on the red head's desk, rattling the ink bottle there and scaring himself.

"You're _our_ Kazekage. You can't ignore us just because he's like you!"

Gaara froze, and Kankuro felt something like cold ice cream drop into his stomach. It wasn't as pleasant as he wished it was. The need to escape washed over him fiercely. He stood his ground, because there was something- _something –_ telling him to wait. Wait and see what happens. Wait; see if that means anything to the red head at all. Gaara moved his hand, and still Kankuro refused to jolt away. He gave himself props for not being afraid, like everyone else was.

Slowly, the red head stood up. Kankuro watched him rise all the way up, eyes finally landing on burning teal. There was a moment of silence, in which Kankuro was sure he was going to die.

"I'm going to speak with him."

It was after the point that Kankuro stood, very confused and relieved, that Gaara stood wondering. Pondering very, very intensely _why._ Now he could understand Kankuro's point of view, standing here and watching Naruto. Slowly, so slowly, he moved around the arena, body taking strange poses for no more than a few seconds before sliding into the next. To Gaara it looked like a super slow, imminently calmer version of Rock Lee's taijutsu.

What was grinding at his thoughts was the fact that Naruto was dressed in all _black._ It was blazing out, though the heat was very dry, thank Kami-sama. Being out for this long (Gaara had been watching for twenty minutes) would make him pass out from heat exhaustion. Longer than that, as Kankuro had suggested was unfathomable. Realizing that he had been idle for far too long, Gaara glided down to where the blonde was. He seemed to be working himself in a circle. The red head was surprised not to find any hint of sweat beading off of the Konoha nin.

Without being asked, Naruto said, "This is taichi. Its meditation and stretching all in one."

"You're going to die of heat stroke," Gaara stated back, in as much of a matter-of-fact tone he could manage. Naruto looked at him, amusement flashing through his eyes, but no smile breaching his features. He breathed in deeply.

"Though that would be true for anyone else, you and I both know that I have never been normal," he replied, and Gaara cringed inside.

 **At least someone admits it.**

Gaara blocked the voice mentally. He had been trying to leap past that obstacle. The thought that he was abnormal would never leave, and he could never deny it. However, he would do _anything_ to sever himself from the hurt that his village was feeling. He would do anything to sever himself from the _nothing_ he was feeling.

 **You're mine brat! You're not goin' anywhere until I get out of here.**

Trying to ignore the blazing hatred he felt, he turned his attention back to Naruto. He was thrown off by the intense blue eyes which blazed at him. He stared back, trying to understand what had just happened. Had he been talking while listening to Shukaku rant?

"I apologize for not paying attention to our conversation," he said, though the intensity in his eyes didn't change. Gaara became even more confused, but decided to hide it.

"You look strange, moving like that and wearing those clothes."

Naruto didn't look away from him, intensity of the moment growing through the air between his azure eyes and Gaara's own. Then he nodded.

"They'll get used to me, sooner or later," Naruto said, looking over in the direction that Gaara had come from. They had all looked at the red head with equal amounts of fear and disgust as they did Naruto. It was very strange to have someone to share this feeling with.

"They've never looked at anyone else like that before," he said, looking over at them. He felt the cold, intense blue rest back on him, but he didn't return it. Only when Naruto shifted did he look. Wind blew blonde tresses about as he smiled at him.

"You'll get used it, sooner or later," he replied. Gaara felt something in his chest and stomach shift and loop and dance like fire. He decided to name it friendship.

 _ **~{hell}~**_

They did get used to it, though Gaara still wondered at the change in focus. He didn't know who was more stubborn; Naruto or the villagers. He didn't really care for that matter, either. It relieved him that they were coexisting. Of course, not talking to one another but they seemed to be on the verge of that front as it was. It contented Gaara, somewhat. As a breeze rolled in through his open window, the air condensed around the red head. He frowned and shifted uncomfortably. After a few seconds, he called for his assistant.

"Yes, Kazekage-sama?"

"Please send out a sandstorm warning for tomorrow," he replied, still looking blankly at the floor.

"Y-yes, Kazekage-sama."

 **You wouldn't have that skill if it weren't for me.**

No one was growing used to Gaara yet, though. He had been in command for a few months now. Nothing had gone wrong. As a matter of fact, things were progressing much more steadily since he came to hold power. Still, it was bitter in his mouth; the taste of their denial of him. He supposed he would get used to the feeling in time, and would even grown to ignore it.

"Let him help," Temari said, bursting into his office a couple of hours later and secretly shocking him. His gourd rattled minutely on his back as he narrowed his eyes as her. He noticed that she had a firm hold on Naruto's wrist, though he seemed to be doing nothing about it. On the contrary, he looked calmly at Gaara, and nodded his head deeply, as if giving a bow. Gaara blinked back, and let his mind rattled with questions as he tried to refocus.

"Is there something you need help with," he asked her, leaning back in his chair. Unlike Kankuro, Temari wouldn't take him working and talking to her at the same time.

"The sandstorm. Let him help."

"There is nothing that needs to be done that cannot be done by our own shinobi," he replied evenly, because he couldn't possibly know _why_ she would want the blonde to help. She thought he was just as annoying a Kankuro did, though in different ways. The brunette would often rave about his strangeness. Temari on the other hand, would rave about his obnoxiousness, though her descriptions of him were far too vague. Gaara decided he was focusing too much on his siblings and too little on his work. Temari sucked her teeth.

"He can help with the loose ends."

"He doesn't know how it works here," Gaara said. Sandstorms weren't necessarily complicated for the Sunites to get ready for. However, in their actions, there was also a well kept knowledge that came from tradition. If a tradition was broken, then there would be an uproar. Gaara didn't want to have to deal with an uproar.

 **Don't you mean you don't want _me_ to deal with it?**

It was a terrible notion; an uproar. He hadn't had to deal with any physically pressing matters since the last time he had gone on a mission. It seemed so far away now. The red head was reminded of the one mission he had gone on with Naruto, when he had felt a spark of hope catch fire in his chest and made him smile. It was a very long time ago, and he didn't do it often anymore.

He felt a tingle, and shifted his eyes to the blonde's. Their intensity blended and stood out within his hard face. He was emotionless, save for the look in his eyes, which Gaara couldn't decipher. He wasn't the best with emotions, nor did he know what he had done to make the blonde look that way.

 **Let's kill him!**

"I took him on a mission. He learns fast," Temari said, and she was cautious. For all of the strength in her voice, it was hard to catch. Gaara knew it from experience, as he did all of his siblings' weaknesses.

"I did not authorize this," he replied, while noticing that his sister had dropped the blonde's arm. She crossed her own and cocked her hip.

"Now I'm trying to _get_ your authorization and you won't even consider it," she growled. Gaara's face twitched as if to sneer. It remained in it's passively stony position.

"You've taken someone who doesn't belong with us out on a mission. Did you forget that he could learn how to kill us, then," the red head asked, he was becoming more frustrated now, and his gourd rattled from the corner of the room, where he had left it. Temari didn't flinch from her spot. She held her ground, her own eyes blazing evenly back at her brother.

 **I want her blood. Kill her. So red. Kill her. So pretty, kill her. Kill her killher killherkillkillkill-**

The soft click of the door opening made them both turn as it cut sharply through the tension. Naruto stood with his back to them, on hand on the knob and the other on the doorjamb. The severity of his posture and the unpleasant mood around him made them withdraw from one another.

"Don't try to argue with him when he's having another conversation, Temari-san."

Naruto shifted out of the room, leaving spinning confusion and tension in the wake of his darkness.

* * *

This story is going to be increasingly long and grueling.

Be ready.


	2. Prologue Part Two

Wooh, we're back up.

 _ **Enjoy.**_

* * *

Gaara's words disconcerted Naruto, even into the next day. It shouldn't have, because _no one_ knew him, save one person, and even that was a bare endeavor. As he sped around Suna, his thoughts haunted him. Unlike Kankuro, Naruto liked to think that he was free enough to think his thoughts.

Except he wasn't.

He felt like a hypocrite really, for judging the Sabaku siblings. He watched as each of them denied themselves in their thoughts, one way or the other. Now he was refusing himself, and it stung. The blonde would wonder if he had caught it from them if he hadn't known that he was like this before. Yes, he denied himself thinking all of the time because thoughts haunted him. Naruto was constantly reminded that he was alone, and that no one knew him. Sometimes, he wished he could be a different person.

And that was where he denied himself. He denied that his life was happening to him, but it _was._ It was and because there was no way to stop it, he was forced to keep going. It was like he had been cursed to run until his feet bled. Or maybe that wasn't the proper metaphor for it. If he thought about it, Naruto thought being chained down in the middle of a sandstorm was better. He was glad that he was enduring this one much better that he had been the first one.

He was awake and he knew how to protect himself and he was _alive._ He was alive with the movement he didn't deny himself he needed. Oh, yes, he could deny the life he lead, but he didn't deny himself movement. He'd been chained down for far too long. Maybe this place was where he could start this healing. There were things he needed; things he denied that he really did. And this place had them. He would start here. He would _stop_ here. He wasn't going to lie to himself anymore.

And it was that decision that left him with satisfaction when he had finished the tasks he'd been given during the sandstorm. It also left him with another decision to make after the whole event was over.

 _ **~{heaven}~**_

"I... I'm sorry."

An electric current shot through Naruto's body. When he had woke up that morning, he had been waiting for his chance to talk to Gaara. Or rather, he had been trying to decide how to go about this talk. It was already well into the day when the red head found _him._ The medicinal gardens they had in Suna were open to almost everyone, though people tended to stay away because it was out of their element. Naruto had stayed there because it reminded him of something, and it gave him the ample amount of ambiance he needed. He hadn't expected Gaara to find him here.

Or to say _that_.

Later on, Naruto would remember and guess that that had been the start of his affection for Gaara. The blonde turned to the red head, blinking in shock. He didn't pretend he didn't hear him, because he knew that this was a _very_ special occasion, and he'd be damned if he got another chance. He smiled at the red head.

"I don't mind."

But Gaara knew that he did. He knew it, because the way that the blonde had walked out of the room. He knew it in the way that the anger or whatever he had been feeling cut across his argument with Temari. He knew it because Naruto already _knew_ what he was apologizing for. The red head stood tensely with his arms crossed. He regarded the blonde carefully, because he didn't know whether it would be rude to stay standing or if he even wanted to sit beside him.

 **Kill him and save the trouble for someone else!**

The thought occurred as he had been taking a step forward. Automatically, his stance shifted defensively. He frowned. He had no intention of killing Naruto. Though the _thing_ had been briefly hinting at it, it had never been so fierce in its mission. Gaara stay frozen there, something wheedling into his mind and holding him in place. If he continued to walk forward, would he hurt-

"Do you need help with that?"

Very suddenly, maybe _too_ suddenly, Naruto was in front of him, eyes blazing a deep blue. Unlike some people had tried to do before, he wasn't looking through him. No, he was looking into him. Deep; deeper than Gaara thought anyone could go.

 **Let me kill him! Rah!**

Inside him the beast raged and the gourd on his back rattled violently. Gaara's eyes widened and he took a step back, trying to control himself.

"I could help you," Naruto said softly. It wasn't like the other times the red head had heard it, when people were trying to use him and kill him or eat his power. It echoed off the walls of the cage inside his body, and held him gently. It was _reassurance._ It was pure comfort that if Gaara _needed_ something, Naruto would give it to him. It shortened his breath; made his mind dizzy with the howling of the beast. He turned and fled. The blonde stared after him, startled by the sudden flurry of action.

Cold determination settled in Naruto's heart.

 _ **~{hell}~**_

"Why would I do that," the blonde asked, flipping the page in his book as if this conversation wasn't happening, He felt Temari twitch beside him. He flipped another page.

"To celebrate the month that you've been here."

"There are other ways to celebrate. Ways that don't involve my face. Which by the way, wasn't the best choice of commemoration if you decided that _I_ would just get up and do it."

Temari blinked at the blank, disinterested tone. Naruto knew that she would become enraged or even _more_ determined to have what she wanted. It didn't make any sense, really. She really had expected him to get up and do it. She didn't _know_ Naruto, not like he did himself. The way he worked was mechanical. He had decided that this was his home, and so his body and his mind acclimated. When he was at home, he could relax. Or be calm enough to stay still.

That was what he did here. He relaxed and slipped out of the body that he had created in Konoha. This was who he was and he wanted to stay here, this way, for as long as he could. People looked at him strangely solely because he was a jinchuuriki, and _not_ because _Naruto was reading a book._ It was annoying that he could only read in the presence of his sister, or when he was shut up inside his house.

It was really one of the most freeing things Suna had to offer him. And with the freedom came that fact that he _really_ needed to talk to Gaara again. He had caught up with the red head once or twice, both times ending with the red head either shouting nonsense or snarling at him. Neither were unfamiliar with the Kazekage running from him. It was obvious that Gaara had no clue what Naruto was talking about. It had been hard to discern since they had only been in contact with each other for short periods of time on both occasions.

Naruto pressed his lips together, trying to focus on his book and Temari and helping Gaara-

"I'll tell you where Gaara is if you do it," Temari said, focusing his senses like sharp sent of coffee after walking through cloud of perfume. He sat rigid, body ready, and mind thinking of all of the things he could and _would_ do for Gaara when he found him. He looked up at her and narrowed his eyes. He forced himself not to grind his teeth. He didn't need her leading him into some unknown abyss of lies.

"I'll find him myself, eventually," he said, body tense as he turned back to the book. The words stop making sense sooner than later though. He stared at one line of the page until the words seemed like gibberish, even to his own, well worked brain.

"Not if he doesn't want you to," the blonde grinned wolfishly. Naruto cringed; both at the thought of the red head's power, and at the thought that he would never succeed in his mission. Naruto grit his teeth hard enough for them to crack before releasing them. He was in a right mind enough to let his rage hurt himself- or anyone else. He closed his eyes breathing in and watching the pages of the book he'd already read flutter behind them. He could feel Temari shift somewhat uncomfortably beside him. He let out his breath.

After a few more seconds, navy blue eyes opened and stared at her, harshness hidden in their depths. Naruto couldn't tell whether he was angry at himself, for not solving this problem with Gaara sooner, with Temari, for trying to wrap him up like some sort of chrysalis, or at Gaara, who played one damned _fine_ game of hide and seek.

"Fine."

 _ **~{heaven}~**_

Naruto had only allowed her to pierce him once in both ears. She had pouted and asked where the fun in that was, but thirty seconds of his navy blue gaze told her that it was nowhere in the vicinity. If he had not had a personal mission at the moment, he would not be so angry with the woman before him. He might have even enjoyed what he was being put through, because he did like the look of the cold silver metal studs in his ears. It matched nicely with the blue of his eyes and his pendant.

"Tell me where he is," he said, severely calm in the face of the rage Temari really brought about him. He handed the piercer money for his services, still wondering why _he_ had to pay for his own mutilation. The blonde made no comment on it. It would not serve him any better in his search for the red head.

"I don't know exactly where he is _but,"_ she hastily added, seeing the red encasing his irises, "I do know how to make it easier while you're looking. You've got sand on you."

He made no move to reply. Obviously, everyone who lived in the village had sand on them. If she was pointing it out to him, there must have been some special case. He stared at her hard until she answered he own statement.

"I suggest thoroughly dousing yourself- clothes and all- in water before you go looking again."

Without so much as a friendly reply, he was out of the door and gone. He had been waiting too long to find the red head and just _help_ him. So, when he got to his house, he went straight to his shower, changed the spray to something lukewarm- because he didn't want to catch a cold- and soaked. He didn't spend too long; only enough time to reign his rage so that he could be of the maximum help to the red head.

Naruto had no idea why he was so hell bent, but he just _was._ Maybe it was that Gaara was really suffering, and no one but he himself could see that. Maybe it was that the red head had already lost enough, and shouldn't have to be trapped with his own mistakes. Maybe it was that they were the same, and they had shared the same loss, and they were looking for the same thing. They both had the same eyes. Eyes that spoke of internal loneliness, of madness that no one would stay near long enough to quell, of a need for companionship so deep that they were losing their very _lives_ as they knew it.

And as Naruto thought these things, his breath quickened and his impatience heightened and his _need_ to find Gaara intensified. The need to maybe not tell him these things, but to make him understand that Naruto would be the only one there to truly help if he needed it raged stronger than anger. And so he found himself in front of Gaara's office door, dripping water on the sharp, shiny floor, hair falling into his face and the fresh wounds of his ears stinging from lingering soap. He knocked; the sound was soft in sound and determined in action.

"Enter."

He knew already that Gaara was shocked to see him. The state that he was in was even more peculiar. He nodded to the red head and closed the door. The resounding click had the Kazekage looking tense and ominous.

"You're covered in water," the red head said, staring very calmly at him and folding his hands together. Naruto's nerves tried to quiver, and he was forced to steel them.

"I was with Temari before I came," Naruto replied carefully, "She told me to do this."

A certain sort of understanding passed through the Kazekaze's eyes. They proceeded to darken considerably and Naruto could almost feel the oncoming growl.

Why did Temari _always_ find a way to disobey him? Didn't she understand anything that he said? Well, if that woman didn't want to listen to anything he said, she didn't have to. She just wouldn't let her go on anymore missions. Paperwork for a month sounded like a good job to him. It was just that it was harder for Gaara to maintain his village than it would have been for any other Kazekage. Letting people in and letting them become apart of the village when they really didn't belong wouldn't sit well with the others. It was just added stress that Naruto was a jinchuuriki. Being alike, the elders would put them together in their group of negative stigma.

They were looking for any reason to sack Gaara, and he didn't want to give them that reason. He had worked hard to get here.

"Don't listen to him."

Gaara almost jumped, and his gourd rattled viciously. Naruto had not made any move from his spot, but was staring determinedly into his eyes. Panic began to settle in the red head, but he didn't know what to do. Naruto had strategically

enough set himself between Gaara and the door.

 **Don't let this punk intimidate you. Kill him.**

"I can help you, Gaara," Naruto replied, staring hard, eyes like a cloudy sky. They were thriving and changing and impossible to interpret. Anger flared up in Gaara, and he clenched his fists.

"You can't help me! I don't want your help," he growled, anger so fierce that he scared himself because he didn't know what to _do_. Sometimes he became so afraid of himself because he didn't want to go back. He didn't want to hurt people like he used to. He didn't want to be out of control, and let unprecedented and unabashed rage come over him. Since he had met Naruto,

he had had goals, and even now they weren't being met, because the insatiable need to _protect_ drove through him thrice over. And he couldn't do anything if he couldn't control himself.

"I understand, Gaara! I understand much more than anyone else ever could," Naruto pleaded, eyes searching him from his safe distance. Gaara snarled at him. He was a liar and a cheat. If he was really unafraid, why didn't he approach?

"You don't know _anything_ ," Gaara snarled.

"I don't? Gaara," he shouted back, "I don't know that he's trying to make you do things that _you don't want to do!?_ "

Gaara's mouth snapped shut, and he grabbed his hair. He shouted wordlessly, not knowing why. Was he trying to drown out Naruto, or the voice in his head constantly trying to eat him.

 **If he's hurting you, then destroy him. You could blame it all on him and-**

"Tell him that, even as weak as I am now, there's no way either of you would be able to kill me. Severely injure me, possibly.. _._ Look at where you are now, Gaara. Look at all you've achieved because you listened to your own thoughts. Let me silence him."

Sand was leaking profusely from the gourd in the corner of the room. It began to swirl around the room, hissing like a swarm of angry bees. Naruto didn't flee the room or even move from his spot. Instead, the sand seemed to empower him.

"It hurts, doesn't it? Not understanding, and not being able to live in your own body? It scares you not to know if he's going to say something to set you off and hurt someone, and destroy your dream. You don't have to lose everything you've ever cared about. You don't have to let your dreams slip from you."

 **He doesn't know what he's talking about. Let's kill him and see if his dreams shatter!**

And that was what struck the cord. Gaara fell into his seat hard. The sands swirling round the room held still. The only sounds were of Gaara's heavy breathing and Naruto's eyelashes fluttering.

"I know better than anyone else, Gaara. I know and I want to help you," Naruto said, not loud but firmly, and the red head saw the same reassurance resting in his eyes as there had been in his voice those long days ago. Reigning himself and fighting as hard as he possibly could, Gaara pulled the sand back into his gourd. It was achingly slow, and Naruto was glad that the red head was taking even this amount if time.

"If," Gaara began slowly, regaining his placidity, "If you helped me-"

"You would be left to your own peace... You have to experience it to know what I'm talking about. "

Naruto still stood in the same position he had been in when he had entered the room. Not even his stance had changed, and he had been standing in the same position for at least a half an hour. Gaara studied him carefully.

"I can't trust you."

"Of course you can't. You don't have any idea who I am, or what I can do. But I can tell you that I come from another village, where I'd worry about the same things you do and hope that you understand," Naruto replied. Gaara stared at him still. Why did the blonde want to help him? It didn't make any kind of sense. He hoped he'd understand... but it didn't make sense to Gaara.

"You have no reason to help me," he said softly. Naruto shook his head.

"The only reason I need is that I've felt that way before. This emotion doesn't make sense, and it never will. I see you striving, and I can't help it if I'm the only one who actually _wants_ to see you succeed."

"Why," Gaara shot back without missing a beat, the blonde's reasoning confusing him. Naruto's eyes lowered to the floor, and Gaara could make out the shock of electric blue from beneath thick blond lashes.

"Because I know what it feels like to lose something you love because you have no control."

Gaara stared at him, nothing but blankness flowing through him.

"Okay."

"You're allowing me to do this? Do you have any other questions?"

"... Will it hurt," the red head asked though he didn't know why. He had barely ever felt real pain, save the pain he had felt in his heart. Naruto tilted his head before slowly closing his eyes.

"Not you."

Gaara sat up a little straighter, eying Naruto carefully.

"It would hurt... you?"

"Most likely," Naruto said, staring steadily at Gaara, "but I'll be careful enough not to get myself killed."

"What if you can't be 'careful enough?' You death will be placed on me."

"It isn't possible. I'm not going to die. Believe it," the blonde said, letting out the first signs of amusement through a smirk. Gaara studied the blonde. When he believed something, he truly believed it, and there was never anything that could change his mind. Gaara looked down at his desk. He was sure that there were risks that he was missing, but the benefits were overriding them in his mind. All he knew was that he would be able to control himself. He would be better than the thing inside himself, and his uphill struggle would be one hundred times easier. Naruto was virtually destroying the useless boulder he was pushing.

"What do I have to do," he asked, inevitably sealing his fate. Naruto searched his eyes before finally moving from his spot. He used a quick, long stride that would make anyone envious. Gaara stared warily at him as he moved closer and closer. The blonde leaned so close that Gaara could feel his warm breath on his cheeks. It was strange. He had never felt something like that, and he closed his eyes in its wake.

"All you have to do is let me look into your eyes," the jinchuuriki said, voice almost soothing the red head's eyes open.

"You're not afraid that I could hurt you," Gaara said, as he looking up into the blonde's eyes. He'd never been this close to someone before. Instead of answering, the blonde looked back at him intensely, his eyes not telling a lie. No, he was not afraid of Gaara. He was there to help.

 _ **~{hell}~**_

Naruto wasn't expecting anything when he arrived in Gaara's o _ni-shitsu._ Of course, his own was like a prison, because his body had harbored nothing but evil and the deadly thoughts of someone much too young to be thinking them. In complete contrast, Gaara's was a sparkling white feldspar atrium. Idly, Naruto thought that Gaara had a gorgeous imagination, but then realized that the red head had probably never been in there, especially if the thing took over his mind so often. It could probably control when and how idle the red head's thoughts became.

The idea irked Naruto.

 **Ehahaha! So you've come to save him!?**

The annoying voice boomed from one end of the hall, lazily catching Naruto's attention. He turned and set down towards it with his same purposeful strides. The hall was very much cooler than he expected, and instead of indiscernible features, there were things about this place that Naruto would be able to remember later on. Hopefully, this would be just another memory, and he would not return here any time soon.

"No," he replied evenly, not looking at the thing that had spoken, but at the hall itself, and what lie there. Gaara's body lay collapsed on its side, hair splayed out over his face in its wake. He looked to have fallen asleep, but Naruto knew that this body wasn't breathing. It was the manifestation of all of Gaara's fears, loathe as it was to admit he had any. Naruto could infer what it meant, because he had concurred the one in his _oni-shitsu._ Or, rather, he had silenced it.

He came to stand in front of the body, and finally looked up. Before him sat a statuesque man... or maybe it was a creature. The thing was so large that Naruto could only see its legs from where he stand. They looked like great pillars, spiraling up and leaning against a white stone just behind them. Naruto paid no mind to the epic proportions of this thing. He didn't need to see its face to talk to it, nor did he feel intimidated by it.

"I'm here to help you shut your mouth."

The atrium began rumbling, and behind him, a great wave of sand broke through the glass. It flooded the hall like a swarm of locusts. It crashed into the floor and spread out to quickly to be moving on pure momentum. Sand began to spear directly toward Naruto. He scowled up a the pillar-like legs and began his dance. His foot slipped once, _only once,_ and the sand came crashing down. Naruto dodged, but the sand still ripped through the cloth and skin of his arm. He cursed and shot himself upward.

Higher and higher his body went, and he watched as the sand climbed with him. It wouldn't be very effective to deflect it; it was merely sand and would shatter away as the demon wished it. Naruto began his slow mantra. He didn't know if this jutsu would work inside Gaara's body, but he knew it had worked in his own. Even with everything that was different about them, they had to be similar enough for him to use this. The blonde's feet meet the glass top of the atrium and he grunted in shock. He pressed his feet into it and then took off.

Naruto cursed as the sand scraped against his arm and left another deep gash. He cursed himself again at his blind movements. He was a shinobi, and had been trained against this, even when the training had been against his own will. He turned his body and flipped away at top speed. Pushing the jutsu faster. He had promised Gaara that he would help him, and so he would.

 _ **~{heaven}~**_

"Gaara... Gaara, its okay now. I'm here to help you."

The red head slowly opened his eyes to the bright light of his office. He looked around and then cringed. Sand lay everywhere, and right at the center was Naruto. Nothing in the room had been damaged, save the blonde on the floor, nursing his injured arm and letting his leg rest and bleed out.

"Tn," the blonde groaned in pain, and Gaara flinched. This wasn't supposed to happen. Naruto said he was supposed to be able to control himself better. But what he saw wasn't the outcome of temper control. In fact, if he'd had any semblance of an idea of what he'd done, he might have called it a tantrum. At first, the red head didn't know what to do. He would be criticized and punished for this mistake. Would they take his position from him? Would they shun him, like they used to, and did now.

"H-How... are you feeling," Naruto grunted as he pushed himself up off the floor. Gaara's eyes widened as he stared at the blonde on the floor. The blonde, who had been hurt by him, was asking him about his health. It was maddening. It was absurd... It confused him, and made his face close off.

"What have you done," his voice asked, though it wasn't really with his permission. Naruto searched his eyes as he slowly peeled himself from his pain. Up he went until he was finally standing, though he was favoring his injured leg. There was a sudden and urgent pounding on the door. Gaara's eyes flicked to it. Naruto paid it no mind.

"I need you to focus. Right now, they don't matter... Tell me if you feel any different," Naruto asked, and it was a hard second before Gaara looked back at him. Naruto hoped he could implore him with his eyes. This was a matter of the red head's medical safety, as well as his mental safety.

"No," Gaara shook his head minutely, and Naruto internally cursed. He should have known. The red head wouldn't be able to tell the difference right away. He pressed his lips together, and told himself that he would just have to watch the Kazekage a little more closely now.

"Put your sand away, and sit down, please," Naruto commanded kindly, his voice soft and a bit tired as he sat int the chair in front of Gaara's desk. He quickly used his worn, slightly damp hands to clear up the red head's desk, and arrange it the way it had been before the incident. He shook the sand out of his hair, and Gaara realized that if they could just act as if nothing had happened. Naruto's wounds were healing more rapidly than he'd ever seen them.

It was disturbing, actually, watching the skin reconnect and scab.

But he had never been injured severely enough for that to happen. He knew that his injuries healed fairly quickly- as they had the only time had ever gotten hurt. He shook himself and took a seat, watching as Naruto's eyes scanned the room and found the little puddle of blood on the floor. In a flurry of movement, he cleaned up the blood, and approached the door.

"I can't stay here," he told the red head over his shoulder, "Tell them that you've only just sensed another sandstorm. Or whatever you'd like."

Naruto seemed colder, somehow, as he spoke over his shoulder. Gaara didn't have time to think about it as the door clicked open. Temari and two Anbu stepped in. In another sequence of forms, Naruto's body was moving, somehow avoiding notice of the three new bodies, and then gone from Gaara's sight.

 _ **~{hell}~**_

Naruto knew from the look in his eyes that he was confused, and relieved, and furious. He welcomed all of these emotions with open arms and eyes, because at least his companion was feeling something, instead of walking around muttering like a stereotypical 'psychopath' with no emotion at all.

No words left his mouth as he approached the blonde. Naruto absently twisted the earring in his ear, and grimaced. He wouldn't _ever_ listen to one of the more idiotic Sabaku siblings ever again. He looked like a bloody girl with these in. Gaara caught sight of them, and his confusion rose a fraction of an inch, but no comment on them was made. That wasn't the focus of their conversation right now anyway and both of the two knew it.

Naruto entered his temporary home and heard Gaara close the door behind them. It locked itself. Naruto led him up and into his library- it was small, but it fit the needs until the blonde could go to the city library. Gaara also closed the door to that room, and Naruto leaned against one of his walls of books. The red head stood with his arms crossed.

"What did you do to me," Gaara asked, immediately accusatory. Naruto absently glanced at the books to the left of his head.

"I did as you asked of me. Of course, I should have explained the after effects."

After effects, _indeed._ Gaara felt strangely empty. It was as if the world had finally become silent, and left him to think. But he wasn't used to that. He was used to having to used half of his attention on blocking the voice in his head, and redirecting the negative attention to help him succeed. Now, all he had was an emptiness the rendered half of his mind unusable. It was like a disease; he was easily distracted, and seemed to space out more than he would have liked.

Gaara growled angrily.

He also had to watch his sand to, because he now seemed to have even more control of it than before, though still not completely. Sometimes little dust storms would rise up over his head while he worked, or a little tornado of sand would walk beside him through the streets. It drew him taut and garnered attention. _Unwanted._

He saw Naruto's eyes flicker over his face and chest, and waited for an explanation. Naruto shook his head, as if to physically get rid of an idea in his head.

"My own bijuu used to speak to me without my consent, so I silence him as well, until I could get a better hold on things. The emptiness you're feeling right now is because the bijuu take up more of your energy than you thought. You're eating less, you don't have much you can focus on, your drive has slowed," Naruto explained as if he were a doctor assessing an illness. Gaara didn't know much about illness, but he knew that what the blonde was saying was true.

"We've had theminside of us for years; there was no way to monitor the changes or effects and no one particularly cared," Naruto muttered rather pointedly, "All you need is meditation. That, along with balancing your routine and your food will calm your body considerably."

Gaara stared at him.

"And you should probably find someone to talk to."

"...Is there a doctor I should go to? Or should I tell someone about the events of the last few days," Gaara asked. Naruto studied him, making sure that the boy before him was not joking, then shook his head.

"No, I mean someone to converse with casually. Make a friend."

Gaara stiffened. He had _tried_ making friends.

"Or you could talk to your siblings. Anyone will do, really."

 _ **~{heaven}~**_

"My favorite color is brown."

Naruto simply listened. It had no

"... My mother's hair... her hair... was golden brown, like honey when you pour it..."

Naruto turned his face to the sky. He hated and admired blue. It was a saddening color, and yet became the heart of so many people's interests. Blue. Blue houses, and blue waters, and blue skies, and blue balls. All of these things meant that people had something to enjoy.

"It was... close to the color of my gourd... That's why I carry it everywhere..."

Gaara talked very slowly; with trepidation. It was as if he expected Naruto to turn and shun him. He took great breaks for the blonde to do so. Even though that blonde from a year ago was utterly different from the one Gaara was meeting and befriending right at that moment, Gaara couldn't mind. He found he just couldn't. Naruto gave him a tentative smile of his own. Gaara sat and stretched legs out before him. He continued to speak.

Naruto listened.

* * *

This is the beginning of their friendship. It's going to get a little weird because we time skip a lot, but don't worry, we'll be back in Suna eventually.

 _ **Until the next time-**_

 _ **~Lee**_


	3. Hollow

Naruto thoughts: Underlined

 **Kyuubi thoughts: Underlined/ bold**

 **Kyuubi speak: Bold**

* * *

It was the crackle of fire that woke the boy up. And he wondered, then, what would happen, as he pulled himself out of the wreckage with her in his arms. He wondered where they would go; what they would do.

They were all that remained of what could have been the greatest legacy in the history of Konoha. Well, he could already tell that they would be even more secretly famous then the recently passed Uchiha.

He had wanted to cry- put his words into screams and shout them at this unconscious girl until she awoke. Until she awoke and held him until he could stop and someone saved them from this.

No one was going to save them- inside there, the other girl was burning, being cremated after death. And the woman... her body was only fragments of what it had originally been, lacking the great evil that could have swallowed Konoha alive.

Now, others were going to come. People who would not believe what the boy and this girl- this _very_ important girl- had been through, or what they could do... and with rising ambition in his heart, the boy knew that no one ever would. He had fallen in love with these girls; wanted to protect them. And one had died in the wake of his love. _This_ girl would not die.

Not if Naruto had anything to say about it.

 _ **~{heaven}~**_

How long had Naruto been in Konoha?

Too long, with too little to show for it, he was sure. He hadn't even visited her yet, had he? Just wandered around and accepted greetings from people that he could almost remember. It was strange to remember, how he had to pretend he had such a big problem with the people looking down on him; how he wanted to become a leader to all of them.

 _Oh_ , if they only knew.

Naruto had led a dangerous band of ninjas, once.

Once, when the thought was barely conceivable to these people. But now, those ninjas had been disbanded and Naruto had gone on to do other things. Things with much less power behind them, and it was almost nothing because of her. Or it could be nothing- and he had _yet_ to visit her. What had it been- three weeks? She'd really kick his ass if he didn't meet up with her soon.

 _Today._

Right after he met this 'new member _.'_ Naruto didn't want a new member of Team 7, honest to goodness gracious. He would have been fine on his own... but then there wouldn't be a point to this, would there? Wearing his favorite color in garish amounts so people would notice him, talking a little too loudly when he was excited, not brushing his hair when he rolled out of bed to meet his team.

Just like he was right now.

Just to go meet another villager that he was to deceive.

He breathed out cold air through his nose. In. And sighed before putting on the slightly unintelligent, blank face.

"Hey, hey, Kakashi-sensei!"

"Here he comes," Kakashi sighed aloud before closing his book and shoving his free fingers into his pockets. Even though it was cloudy, Naruto seemed to make sunshine all on his own with his boisterousness. He waved and grinned at Sakura, who stood right by with her usual peeved look on her face.

In the back of his mind, Naruto wondered if he was the only one who ever changed.

"Hey, Sakura-chan," he grinned slyly, and made her roll her eyes. He made a despondent face at her, glanced at Sasuke and opened his mouth to curse him out- like _always._

"Your attempts at hitting on her will never be successful."

Naruto turned his head slowly and regarded the person in front of him. And felt immediate annoyance at the fact that there was a member of Anbustaring at his interaction. One didn't _leave_ the Anbu- unless they became the Hokage or a jounin, under special terms, like Kakashi's case. Which meant that someone was making this poor, poor fool watch Naruto. He scowled at the guy and let his cheeks heat up.

"Oi, who are you to say that, bastard!?"

"That's the new member, Naruto," Kakashi waved a hand in introduction and began to make his way away, "Why don't you get to know each other better?"

"Eh, who has time for that," Naruto muttered under his breath, "I've got better things to do."

"Eating Ramen isn't something better, Naruto," Sakura implored, and Naruto blushed.

"Hey, I haven't had any Ramen since I got back," Naruto complained, and his stomach growled in agreement.

"Maybe the reason that you do not have many brain cells is due to the fact that you consume too much Ramen," the pale teen said, and Naruto's face twitched with rage.

"Nani," he said, quietly, menace on his face and anger on his teeth.

"I read a book that said that things like that are harmful to one's health. I also read that a good way to make friends is to give one another nicknames," the smiling teen said, as he turned to Sakura, "Nice to meet you, _minikui."_

" _Ugl-"_

Naruto reflexively pulled the new soul out of the way of Sakura's punch. He didn't know if it was his training, or not being used to being back in Konoha, or because he felt genuinely bad for anyone who was hit by the impressively strong female. There was a good few moments of tense silence. Around the corner came Asuma's team, and Naruto and Sakura turned at the sounds of their voices. Quickly, Naruto pushed the new man away from him and waved.

"Hey, Choji! Shikamaru! Ino!"

"Must he shout our names like that in the street like that," Shikamaru said, "Man, what a drag."

"Who's this," Ino said, eying the new guy up like a piece of meat. Naruto thought he was going to be sick; tried to pretend like he didn't see it.

"Hello, Beautiful," he smiled at her.

"Nani," Sakura fumed, and Naruto felt exasperation tinge at the edges of his brain. He put it out. He was good at this- very good. No emotion would be on his face unless he wanted it to be. Instead he edged closer to Choji and hoped to catch his attention so that he could politely ask for a chip under the guise that it might tide him over until he could have some Ramen.

Instead, it made the pale, rude man's attention refocus on Choji. He began, "It's nice to meet you too, fa-"

 _Smack!_

Naruto was sure he had a good hold on this person's jaw right then. He made sure not to flex his middle or little finger, because what in the _hell_ would he look like, breaking someone's jaw bone that way? He watched Choji crack for half a second like everyone else.

"What... was that," the larger young man said, eyes twitching with anger.

"Ah, don't worry about it, Choji," Naruto grinned at him, and he had to keep a little extra laugh at the end out of it so that it didn't seem so practiced, and more like socially strained like someone would at this moment.

"Have you guys eaten yet? This guy's treating me to Ichiraku so I can get to know him better," he said; his voice was practically grumbling, "New member, or whatever."

"We were just on our way to go figure out what we wanted to eat," Choji said, now calmly munching on his chips.

"Why don't you eat with us," Naruto asked, grinning from ear to ear and still clenching the guy's jaw, "And Sakura- chan too!"

Sakura looked unsure and almost amused at the young man with his face still clenched firmly in Naruto's grip. She shrugged and then nodded. Everyone made little sounds of agreement, because what better to do than to agree with Naruto's will.

He grinned once more, and said, "Great! I just have to run home to get my coupons. I'll take Badmouth-san with me!"

And he looked at the Anbu with eyes sharper than usual, and a grin of menace glinting on his face. His hand shifted away from his mouth, only to hook beneath the hem of his too short shirt. His smile twitched and cracked for a second before he disappeared.

…

Naruto threw him down just outside his house door and stared down at him. He was new- there was no need to keep up the carefully practiced facade he used in front of everyone else. He was going to use the excuse that this person had no emotions, and was also a spy. What reason should Naruto have for coming up emotionally short with him?

"What's your name," Naruto asked softly, watching the young man with sharp eyes. The pale man still smiled at him, and Naruto had to wonder if the Anbu had ordered him to wear that smile at all times, or if he was trying to grasp something unreachable.

"Sai."

Sai watched Naruto pause for a minute before a viscous little smile crossed the blonde's face.

" _Sai?_ No, I don't think so," he laughed meanly, "You don't have a name."

Sai's face twitched into something a little more convincing. Naruto thought that the blank look on his face suited him. It was much more truthful than anything Naruto had yet to see. Naruto still looked down on him with an evil air about him. He said, "Listen, Anbu-san. I'm going to tell you a secret."

He leaned down into a crouch, and put his fingers on his knees. He watched Sai's face for a moment, before putting on a smile the mirrored Sai's exactly.

"I'm not going to harm the village, nor am I going allow myself to be used by the people in it. Understand that. Tell _Danzo_ that too, if you must. Whatever they think is going to happen would have happened a long time ago, or not at all."

Sai said nothing.

"I am going to let you watch me... because I can't make you disappear without repercussions," Naruto explained, "Be good to me, Anbu-san. And I'll be very, _very_ kind to you."

…

"Naru-nii," she greeted as soon as the door chimed. When her eyes landed on Naruto, she stopped dead in her tracks. Her eyes flickered between her brother and this _new_ person. She raised an eyebrow.

"And who might you be," she asked, barely keeping a sneer from her voice.

"Sai," the newcomer said. The girl standing before him, only shorter by an inch or so, looked like the a backwards Naruto- a short blue bob of hair, and large, catty golden eyes.

" _Anbu-san_ ," Naruto corrected, looking sharply at the brunette, "He's supposed to be watching me for viscous intent. Making sure I don't leave the village and plot a coup against them. So that they can fully utilize me or whatever."

The girl with the golden eyes gave her brother a look of amusement. It was fleeting. She watched Sai for a moment, eyes bright and sharp and purposeful. The newcomer might have felt a little insulted about his name being misused, or not used at all, but he was a member of the Anbu Black Ops. He wasn't there just to become a part of the team.

"You don't know my aniki," she said, "You'll never know him like I do. So let me assure you... Whatever he does... he does it for this village. For _us."_

The smile on her face was kind, and her eyes seemed knowing. She motioned between the two of them, and to the expanse of the store, which Sai was supposed to take as the whole of the village. He stared at her, and then at Naruto, and back. Her eyes then seemed to be much less kind.

"I was not aware that you had a sister... I'm not sure anyone is," Sai observed. The chiming of the bell made him turn to see Naruto. Not the one he had first met; definitely not. But one a little more 'sense,' if you will. One with stranger tastes and less to hide and different intentions on his face.

 _Frightening._

"Do not try to use my sister against me," Naruto said softly, "Every second you do, will be a second in which your lungs turn to dust and your tongue to fire. I will make you into something that can never be undone."

Sai held little doubt that he would, seeing all that he had been hiding on his face right then. The girl broke the tension, "Pleasure to meet you, Sai-san. My name is Uzumaki, Hitori."

Sai bowed. Hitori smiled back and warned, "Brother is very serious."

 _ **~{hell}~**_

"Sasuke!"

That was Sakura calling. It was always Sakura calling, and even though Naruto had promised her, he had decided to do this on his own too. Sasuke could either be a thorn in his side with poisonous fibers, or he could be a thorn in his side that was more like a splinter.

Naruto had lived with splinters all his life. A good share of them were standing on those grounds, then, actually. Sasuke was standing there with a petty look of superiority on his face. Naruto was going to wash it away.

And Naruto was going to break him.

And Naruto was going to bring him back.

Sickness and anger rose up in him. He had been abandoned. All of them had been left behind for this. So that one person could become stronger and kill the only living relative that he had. Wasn't that absurd? Didn't anybody else see the stupidity in that? Or was he the only one who grew up and saw things how they truly were?

But then, Naruto already knew about the extraordinary traits that he was born with.

"Sasuke..."

He wasn't going to let the sharpness in his gaze shine through. Not until he was fighting with the traitor.

"I don't have time for you," the brunette said, and Naruto could feel his superiority complex through the distance. Naruto wanted to laugh, because he had been that way when he was younger. He had walked out in the streets of Konoha, all night, knowing that he could kill all of them if he really _really_ wanted to.

"Are you going to run away again, Sasuke," Naruto challenged, because someone with an inflated head would never resist, "Are you running now, without even fighting me?"

And Sasuke smirked.

Naruto knew then that the battle had begun. He said, "I'm challenging you, Sasuke."

But that snake-bastard had to get in the way.

"We are leaving."

But no, they weren't, because Naruto and Sasuke had unfinished business, just like all Uzumaki and Uchiha. And Naruto knew that Sasuke saw that, because he told the old man, "Don't get in my way."

"Sai, Sakura-chan. I think you should fight that snake-bastard. I'll try to get Sasuke," the blonde said, and removed a scroll from the pack on his side. He bit his thumb and ran it across.

"I only want this one," he said, and from the scroll he pulled a long staff. He put the scroll away, and swung the staff over his head. He grinned. It had been a few months since he had practiced and really used this staff. It was too much of reminder to use more than once every six months or so. He felt his heart scrape against his rib cage.

"Let's fight with this, Sasuke," he said. Sasuke's face twisted into a condescending smirk. Naruto let the anger of years seep into him as he let Sasuke laugh. It would only serve him greater purpose in this fight.

A fight which- against all odds- he was going to win. The wind howled in Naruto's ears, and rattled around in Naruto's body, and he remembered just how empty he was. Why should he let Sasuke be the one to affect him differently? No, he had already affected him. So the proper question was;

Why should he let Sasuke get away unharmed?

"You think we're still children, Naruto. This isn't playtime."

Laughter almost bubbled up from Naruto's throat and he clenched his teeth to keep it inside. It wasn't even proper laughter; but angry chortles that he wanted to let out and use to stop Sasuke's heart from beating.

They were still kids. Sixteen was hardly old enough to be doing anything properly if you were a civilian. And in the three years that they had been apart, Naruto had learned more than Sasuke could have learned in his entire life. He had learned things about himself that Sasuke could never have dreamed of knowing. Not without trial and tribulation and suffering.

Sasuke had not suffered enough.

Not yet.

"If I win," Sasuke said, stepping down into their arena, "I'll kill you.

And this time Naruto let himself smile. He smiled like he had at those men who had hurt his loved ones all those years ago. He let his teeth glint, his lips crook and stretch almost uncomfortably. He let Sasuke see the evil things that were behind his eyes- the things that no one ever saw and lived to tell about.

The things underneath Naruto's mask.

"I'll beat you until you can't move."

Naruto meant that as a fact.

 _ **~{heaven}~**_

He had to share a room with the bastard, because apparently, being healed for chakra strain, muscle strain, lacerations, broken bones, and a head injury was _not enough of a lesson._

Naruto had instinctively opened his eyes facing the window. He looked out and watched clouds float. It was his absolute _least_ favorite past time. People like Shikamaru liked to do it because they had time to think- time to contemplate next moves, the meaning of life, what they were going to eat for dinner.

Naruto did not watch clouds. Not unless he was about to die.

Strange how the most insignificant things could change from his perspective.

The blonde forced himself to keep his breathing even. He did not want confrontation with Sasuke and Sakura and talk about all of those messed up things. He did not want the sense he had been wishing he could drill into Sasuke's head to slip from beneath his carefully crafted mask. He did not want to have a proper conversation with Sakura just once; didn't want to be acknowledged as the victor. Some of the things he had done had been fairly illegal, and that muscle strain had not come from Sasuke. He did not want to explain or to let them comment or anything.

So he was 'sleeping' when Sakura walked into the room. He closed his eyes and slipped into the place he knew that no voice could truly reach. Not one with any sort of reason, anyway.

 ** _…_**

 **Back again, brat?**

Naruto's attention was not steadily preoccupied by that voice. Instead, he was caught up in the making of the cage; the very sight of his father's seal. He moved closer to study it. He gauged that it wouldn't be destroyed if he just touched it, but he'd physically have to peel it away.

 **Has that world become too much for you? Come, come. Free me and I'll teach them all how to bow down.**

Naruto laughed. He laughed a deep, somber, mortifying laugh at the Kyuubi. He felt the beast bristle with unbridled anger, with rancid chakra boiling from right between the bars and trying to grab him. He continued to laugh as it simply squirmed around him and died away. He would not let it.

" _You?_ Teach _me?_ You can't even teach yourself new tricks, dog."

 **Let me out and I'll show you what it's like to be a dog!**

"How about... I step into that place, with you," Naruto's eyes gleamed in challenge. His face twisted happily and Kyuubi was so wrapped in his anger that he did not know the difference between this child and the one who had been in there to visit him so few times.

It wasn't hard for Naruto to pass through the barrier. As he did, he took in all its components, and realized he had reached a level he supposed his birth father had never thought he would reach. Really, he wasn't supposed to be there at all. Him standing beyond the barrier was in and of itself a paradigm. Naruto grinned with sharp white teeth.

"Now what'll you do," he challenged, "Kill me, kill yourself, too?"

Kyuubi bristled in front of him, tails whipping and turning in conflict. Naruto turned and ran his hand across the bars.

"Doesn't it get... lonely in here," he asked, changing the topic and turning his back the beast. He looked out into the vast emptiness, and opened his mouth wide and shouted, "AAAAAAAAAAAHHH!"

For a short while, the sound bounced off the walls, and died under the pressure of the muting waters. He lifted his feet and stomped, and knew that this place was way too damned damp. He also realized that there wasn't enough light; that he didn't know where the light in this place was coming from either.

 **Have you lost your mind, brat? Shall I take it over for you?**

"...Yes," Naruto replied, grinning sadly down at his reflection, "I have but you won't be taking it over. That's quite impossible seeing our roles in this."

 **Our..?**

"I'm sorry, I wasn't the one who created this cell. If I had," Naruto said, passing back through the bars and sitting in the waters just beyond them, "it probably would have been more comfortable looking than this."

 **Whatever. You humans are just relentless, lying, little insects.**

"Are we," Naruto laughed, "I hadn't noticed."

 **Quite rich for someone so flat. Why are you bothering me now?**

Naruto leaned back and looked up, and realized he couldn't even see the ceiling. He said, "It must be so lonely inside of this place. Imagine being this cell, Kyuubi-chan."

 **Oi, oi. You don't have license to call me that.**

"Imagine just being this empty container... like a dirty jar of nothing. No one can see inside of you, and no one can feel this. Yet somehow they all know that you've got another living, breathing creature in you. And it must be so lonely in here," Naruto said, voice getting lower and slower and sadder with every breath.

 **No. It doesn't get lonely if the world is made up of brats like you and nasty little humans.**

"What were you, before?"

The Kyuubi sat down, shock written on his frozen tails. Naruto's voice was deep and accusing, as if he knew everything there was to know about Kyuubi. Slowly, the blonde turned, and his eyes were cutting and knowing.

 **What?**

"What were you? Before this was you, and you were passed down from human container to human container, what _were_ you," Naruto asked accusingly, face so close to the bars that he was practically in them. Kyuubi was silent, because there was no possible way that Naruto knew anything about him. The brat he had been stuck with was simply that; a brat who knew nothing about the history of the world, of his village, or anything else.

"It gets lonely, right," Naruto whispered again, like a freak in a horror film, "It gets lonely in here, with no friends, no family, no one to greet you at all for more than ten years until I came along."

They stared into each other's eyes with a painful intensity that rivaled the flow of the Kyuubi's chakra.

"I could take you out. Could bring you out and let you roam around, and feel real air, instead of just hearing the sound of it. You could live like an actual being, instead of just a concept of massive chakra."

 **I am already more than that brat!**

"Do you feel like it?"

 _ **~{hell}~**_

Naruto didn't move until he heard Sakura's footsteps echo down the hall. He'd been eavesdropping on their not so important conversation. Sakura had simply come to subtly flirt with Sasuke, and to tell him about how Tsunade had decided on his punishments- all to be fulfilled after he was up and well again.

They'd also had a little chat about Naruto; about Sasuke being back and what it was like having both he and Naruto gone and how Sakura wouldn't be able to tell the difference now that they were both home. Naruto had held in both his quips and his fury. He had been alive and well for many years because he wore his mask so beautifully. With some even, deep breathing and a reminder that everything they had talked about was what he hadn't wanted to hear in the first place and he knew that, Naruto calmed himself.

He then sighed out, pretending to wake himself up and slowly shifted up in his bed.

"I know you were listening in," Sasuke said from behind him, probably eying him over and wondering how he could be moving after the battle they had had. Naruto almost grinned out the window, but he didn't even show the sun his face.* Instead he stood up and pulled the bandages from his body before pulling on his folded pants and jacket.

"I don't know what you mean, teme," Naruto said casually, making his bed and throwing his bandages down on it. He took a half second to stretch and then opened the window.

"Don't you ever do anything the proper way," Sasuke asked in exasperation, and he sounded amused to himself for some reason.

Naruto decided he would not join in with this amusement as he replied quietly, "Of course not."

He then proceeded to escape through the window.

* * *

Much better at getting the point across.

*There's a saying (in some culture) that showing your face to the sun means going outside and getting some sunshine. What I meant it to mean was that Naruto was a dark shadow and that he's pretty much a hermit in his own body.


	4. Morning Distress

My writing is getting _lazy_. Yuck.

Naruto thoughts: Underlined

 **Kyuubi thoughts: Underlined/ bold**

 **Kyuubi speak: Bold**

* * *

" _Hah..._ _Hahhh..."_

Naruto rolled over, with hazy eyes, and sought out the product of the last two days work. He was in pain; every muscle around his lower abdomen hurt, his eyes felt like they were bleeding, and he was famished. He bet he was going to pass out again before he could even get anything to help himself.

He wouldn't do it before he could feel the kyuubi's new form. He wouldn't until was sure he had succeeded. Slowly, with blurry eyes and an aching body, he pulled himself about his bedroom.

" _Haahhh... hah... guh...ha..."_

Finally, he felt fur, matted with substances that Naruto couldn't name nor see in his state. With a sigh, in some sort of relief, he collapsed back onto the floor and passed out again.

Even unconsciousness could not stop his mind from locking his body down and fading into limbo.

 _ **~{heaven}~**_

 **Slam, Slam, Slam!**

"Naaaaa. Ruuuuuu. TOOOOOOO!"

"Fuck," the blonde hissed hot breathe into his own mouth, and then shook his head at the taste. He blinked a few times, but was sure that his eyes had returned to normal, save the fuzz from sleep.

"Naruto! Naruto! Get your ass out here! I know you're there," the shouting and the slamming continued, with Naruto's door cracking and whining in pain. _'Fuck,'_ Naruto thought again, pulling himself onto his elbows. If he could wish for any one thing to be returned to him, would be the ability to make anyone silent. Without a second thought, he scooped up the dirty, motionless form that lie beside him and scrambled as quietly as he could into the bathroom.

He pulled the knobs and turned the water as hot as he would dare with his ward in a potentially precarious state. Naruto thought he looked like a new-born; with blood and other substances matting his fur. He leaned over and practically had a panic attack when he could barely hear any breathing, which was watery at best. He pulled all of his clothes off as the banging grew louder and louder, and scooped the fox into his arms.

He did not wait to make himself comfortable before he was cleaning his ward, checking for wounds, and trying to figure out what was wrong with him. He knelt down, and held the fox as gently as he could in one arm before he began shoving his fingers down his throat. At first nothing happened. Again and again, he shoved and tried using a bit of chakra to push. Finally, the little animal squirmed and regurgitated fluids into the tub. Naruto was glad he didn't remember how the kyuubi had come out of his body.

 **Don't you ever stick your fingers down my throat again! Next time I'll bite them off!**

The little fox 'kyu'ed angrily in his arms.

 **What the-!?**

You're not used to talking out loud. So just stay silent. There is someone coming.

 **Restore me to my full size, you little cunt! The deal-**

The deal was that I'd let you out. Let you see what the world has become since you were sealed away. Not simply a glimpse, but a true feast for your body. I did _not_ say I would entertain your ideas to wreck my home as soon as I let you out.

 **Che! Smarter than you look.**

I take pride. Now, I can either hold you down, or you can enjoy the warmth of the water while I clean everything up and get rid of my headache.

The kyuubi did not reply. Naruto, with his head pounding, glad of it. He then realized that the banging had gotten much closer. And harder. Within a few seconds, the blonde thought, his bathroom door would be broken. Without a second thought, the blonde closed his arms around the red haired fox and curled into himself. He was bitten.

 **Let go of me, you fucking-**

Keep squirming and I'll snap your neck. Remember, fox, that I'm in charge of you and more than anyone else I have power over you.

 **I'll kill you.**

You'd die with me.

The door slammed open just at the fox relaxed. Naruto stroked the back of his neck slowly and discreetly to keep him that way. In his own body, he was panicking. How long had he been in the water? Was his body showing the parts that no one knew about, except for her? How was he to explain them; the gruesome twists and angles depicted along almost every inch of skin, save the space between them? He hoped to everything that he loved that the water hadn't washed away his cover yet.

"Naruto!"

"How rude can you get," he said immediately, because he needed a moment to get himself together and he didn't want to be caught like this.

"If you know someone's taking a shower, can't ya just wait," he growled angrily, and curled himself in tighter. The person, who had come in seemed to be abashed, and Naruto didn't even need to look up at her to know that it was Sakura. Tsunade didn't have the same sort of 'finesse' for these sort of things, and no one's chakra felt like Sakura's. He had been obsessed with her in his first few years of knowing her, just because of the feel of her chakra.

But knowing that someone who you wanted would never pay attention to you had done a number on Naruto's personality even before he had met her. She stuttered apologies and closed the door; tried to, but it was broken. Quickly, Naruto reached over and threw a stool in front of it so that it would not come open while he was showering. As he did so, the Kyuubi wiggled from his body and skittered up to the window.

Where do you think you're going?

 **To see the town, of course. Didn't think you could keep the kyuubi locked in here for all eternity, did you?**

If I wanted you locked into any place, I would have left you inside the chamber that I had you in.

 **Hmmf.**

Don't get cocky, fox, and don't try anything. I can pull you back at any moment, so when I call, come.

 **I'm not your pet, stupid fucking human!**

If you don't want to become my pet, then do what I say. I've given you freedom, so all I ask it that you don't ruin it. And...

 **What? Shall I wag my tail like a good pet!?**

Tell me your name. You know mine- tell me yours.

… **Kurama, but don't call me whatever you please.**

Alright. Go.

The fox demon took off, leaving Naruto to soak and clean himself up and get his persona back together. Really, it was so troubling to have people waiting outside his door and a newly released fox demon prowling about his village. He had withheld some of the Kyuubi's powers; he could feel that. It was only that that gave him relief that he would be blamed for something that wasn't that big of a deal.

Naruto groaned; he was thinking too far ahead. For now, he should finish cleaning himself up and dealing with Sakura. Slowly, he began to decide whether he would let her drag him back to the hospital or not.

 _ **~{hell}~**_

It had been two days since Naruto had seen Kyuubi and today was not a day he could go without him. After a long, tedious day of training and watching Sasuke and listening to Sakura prattle on and sharing looks with Sai, they had decided to get something to eat. It was Kakashi's treat, after all, since he had just returned from an equally trying mission that none of them knew the details about. Naruto pulled out his wallet and pretended to go through it.

"Ah, damnit, I forgot," he exclaimed, making everyone pause and turn to him, just like he knew it would. He wondered how he never got incredibly tired of this; making everyone here follow him and bend to everything he ever said. Sometimes his face plate did get a little... irritable, around the edges.

"I've gotta go shopping for food else I won't have anything for later," he said, and his stomach growled right on time, and he wished his whole goddamned body wasn't about this ride. He was beginning to get weary of the life and lie he was living.

"Jeez, usaratonkachi, we all know you're just going to get ramen," Sasuke snorted, and Naruto was amused because the idiot had _no_ idea what Naruto's life was about, unless he gave it to him.

"Oi, oi! Don't judge what I eat! And anyway, I have to get- whoops, I forgot," Naruto exclaimed even more loudly, making the whole of the block flinch. It was one of his small joys in life. Putting two fingers together and placing them under his tongue, Naruto whistled loud enough for the village to hear.

Kyuubi. Come.

 **What was the point of asking my name if you weren't going to use it?**

You were the one who said not to call you whatever I pleased. So I'm calling you as correctly as I can.

 **Calling me!? Che! Like I'd come!**

You will, or I will drag you.

Naruto made the whistle sound again. When Kyuubi's mind didn't respond, he lashed out with as single line of chakra and began reeling him in.

 _ **What the!?**_

I will ask you nicely now, to save you from this. Will you please come to me?

 **Grr.**

Immediately, Naruto felt the line shorten itself much faster, with far less resistance. Without a second's hesitation he cut the line, and put a large, fake grin on his face.

Thank you.

 **Fuck you.**

"Did you forget to practice your whistling? Is it a hobby of yours," Sai asked, "I read that people who lead empty lives take up hobbies."

Naruto shot Sai a dry look. At least with Sai, he could show some of his more... uninterested side. Sai knew the side of him that distrusted and twisted with malice and couldn't stand stupidity for longer than ten minutes. He knew and still decided to help Naruto play the game that he was playing. The blonde didn't know whether to be grateful or annoyed that he had someone on something like equal footing with him.

"Its not a hobby, you jerk. I was- Ooof!"

Naruto's body planted face first into the dirt, which he was expecting. He should have just spun around and caught the Kyuubi round the neck for even trying it. Instead, he let the little fox yap and 'kyu' from right on top of him.

 **This close enough for yah?**

"What is that," Sakura pointed, because she had never really liked larger animals that much, and big canines were on the bottom of her list. She was always standing a good distance away from Akamaru, whenever she had to. In a quick move, Naruto rolled over and encased the Kyuubi in his arms.

Not quite.

 **Why you little fucking-!**

In his arms, the little fox struggled and squirmed. Naruto tightened his arms and turned to his friends, "I was calling for this guy here!"

He gave them a chance to get a good look at him and said, "Guys, this is Kyu-chan. I need to get him some food or else he'll be grumpy. Like he is right now."

Naruto gave the fox a dangerously tight warning squeeze before he relaxed his arms. The little animal growled and made a high pitched 'Kyu' sound. He knew that the Kyuubi could feel his amusement in his head, because the little animal bit his arm.

"Its biting you," Sai watched with raised eyebrows. Naruto put on a look of pain, but he let the Kyuubi do what it wanted.

"I don't think that having a pet is the best idea," Sakura muttered, and looked as if she wanted nothing more than to throw it off and heal the wound or to leave the situation altogether.

"He's just hungry," Naruto squeaked, eyes falsely watering with pain. He grit his teeth.

"How are you going to take care of a pet," Sakura admonished slightly, now looking at Naruto's person with doubt in the lines of her face. Naruto wanted to force it into expressionless marble. He let the pain of the Kyuubi's sharp teeth soothe him back into his role.

"You can't barely take care of yourself, baka," Sasuke quipped, and Naruto sent him a slow, quiet, burning gaze that he was sure wasn't supposed to be apart this facade. With a scowl he turned back into his normal, practically idiotic self, and said, "Urusei! It's none of your business anyway! So I'm keeping him, bastard!"

Sasuke's eyes narrowed, as if he had just seen something suspicious happen. He did not comment on it. Naruto doubted he could put anything together properly. He just wasn't that clever, and Naruto knew he wasn't the best at getting the big picture, no matter how had he tried.

"N-N-N-Naruto-kun," Hinata squeaked behind him, and he turned and put on a pleasantly surprised face.

"Hinata-chan," he greeted nicely and artificially, "How's it goin'?"

"U-u-u-mmm. H-Hokage-s-sama would l-like to see you... s-soon," she stuttered. She was trying to look Naruto in the face, but her eyes only reached his chest of the animal in his arms or the people just behind him. He smiled at her. She was cute- in the way that she hid her ferociousness behind stutters. If anyone knew that stuttering was a nervous tick that she had when she was lying, then oh, how things would start to look.

"Huh?Baa-chan? Ehn, well, I've got something to do now," Naruto hesitated. Behind him, he could feel Sakura grow annoyed.

"Didn't she call you, you idiot? You can go shopping later," Sakura replied angrily, and Naruto's face grew dark in Hinata's presence. Her eyes grew wide and she let out a small yelp, which she quickly covered by stuttering, "A-ah, N-N-Naruto-kun. You d-don't have to g-go now."

Naruto's face slackened and turned apologetic one second after another before he bowed to her. He thanked her and said, "I really should go shopping now if I want to get there before Baa-chan loses her temper."

Without waiting for any hearsay, Naruto disappeared with the still aggravated fox in his arms.

 **Let go.**

No. You're the one biting my arm, first and foremost. Also, you _need_ to pick something out to eat. I'm not gonna let you starve yourself to death or eat other living creatures.

 **Is that too animalistic for you? Need a more human pet?**

I don't need a more human _anything._ What I need is for you to not go out and kill things. I also need to be able to take care of you.

 **I'm not helping you with this facade you've got.**

I don't need your help. I've been doing this long before you.

 **Che, right.**

Do as I tell you and things will settle themselves out. Eventually, you will not even need to listen. Eventually, you will understand.

The Kyuubi released his hold on the young blond's arm and watched his face inquiringly.

 ** _…_**

 _Knock, knock._

"Come in," Tsunade addressed softly beneath the small hill off paperwork she had left. She'd been very sober for most of the week, with Shizune's help. It had been so progressive that Tsunade had been proud of herself. She wondered why she did not do this more often. The clarity of her thoughts and the absence of the times she passed out from too much alcohol were a novelty, though they shouldn't be.

The door gave a soft click and opened to reveal Naruto. His clothes were bright; a contrast to his waiting face. He closed the door behind him, meandered close to her desk and took a seat. He waited for to finish, which she had always appreciated about Naruto. She also appreciated his closeted kindness, because she had worked through quite a few things with him by her side.

"Congratulations," she said as she signed the last paper and put it into the basket of finished works.

"I could say the same to you, Baa-chan," he said, smiling as his eyes swept her desk. She chuckled at him.

"This should be normal, damned kid. And don't call my granny," she admonished with no real conviction. She watched him, and his smiling face settled back into a waiting one under her gaze. She looked down at her hands on the desk and said, "Really kid. Congrats. You got him back."

"Yeah well," Naruto said, looking displeased about it, "I said I would."

"Right. Now we just have to figure out what to do with him."

"You and I both," Naruto growled, mostly to himself. Tsunade watched him for merely moments before she got to what she wanted to say.

"I want to make you a jounin. I was thinking about the tests that I could give you as proof-"

"Wait," Naruto practically laughed, but his face was displeased, "Wait. You want to what? You've got to be kidding me? And how did you just decide this?"

Tsunade winced; she had guessed that Naruto would not be happy about this. She'd been trying to rush though the idea of his induction, but Tsunade should have known better than to try it. Naruto was her best, left-hand ninja, off the record. Tsunade couldn't stand to lose his trust.. She tried to think of something to ease him with, but she only came up with the truth, "Naruto... I thought it was your goal to excel in the ranks. Honestly, I'm trying to help."

The blonde snorted. Tsunade scowled right back and said, "I wanted to be able to give you a little more freedom- let you pick and choose your missions. I was hoping to slacken the burden with the Anbu watching; keep you out of harm's way-"

"Out of harm's way? They've sent a member of Root to watch me personally. As if they could get any more transparent," Naruto growled, "This city is sinking if you can't control all of its members, Tsunade-sama."

"The Anbu's been apart of this place before I, and Danzo has a tight hold on them."

"You don't have to tell me about them," Naruto said darkly, looking out of the window briefly, "I know just as well."

Tsunade grew more aggravated by the very person she had been trying to help. She sighed, counted slowly to ten, and then said, "I'm trying to help you avoid this. This is the best way I know how. Along with this, the Akatsuki are on the rise, and you know it. I know its easier for you to fight and defend yourself when other people aren't around."

"This wouldn't help," Naruto replied with a shake of his head, "It would only make them turn to you, and then to my friends, and try to watch me more carefully. They'd go through the missions I would be taking, they would have a reason to prosecute the both of us and put us away for later use."

Naruto looked intensely displeased. Tsunade felt displeased with herself. She knew all of these things; had known them. She had been convinced, somehow, that things would work out in the strange way that they did for Naruto.

"Mm... The stress of being Hokage is getting to me. My reasoning isn't up to par. It had seemed like a good idea when I talked about it with the Kazekage," she said, shaking her head at herself, realizing she had been goaded by a kid. Well, she'd never let something like _that_ effect her decisions again. She looked up at Naruto's face and felt herself frozen with dread. He looked furious.

"Gaara? Gaara asked you to do this," he asked, eyes alight in vengeful way that would not be settled by anything that Tsunade said. She shook her head.

"We had a meeting, a while ago... He simply suggested a solution to my concerns. I didn't agree at first but the idea got to be more tempting as the conversation went on."

Naruto looked like he wanted to go off. His mouth grew more twisted as the silence filled the room. He closed his eyes for a very long moment and said, "I want a mission there."

"Excuse me?"

"I want a mission to Wind Country. Sunagakure," Naruto corrected himself, because if he didn't she was sure to give him a mission in the wrong place, "I want one soon, Tsunade."

"What? You can't make-"

"Can't I? You and another Kage were plotting something that has to do with me- _whether it was good or not_ ," he talked over her rambling excuses, "Both of you know better. Your duty is to the country, not me. So I want a mission there. I've got something to speak about with the _Kazekage_ in person."

"... Alright," the Hokage acquiesced, "give me a few days."

" _Soon,_ Tsunade-sama," Naruto pressed.

"Right," she complied.

* * *

I did _not_ mean to make Tsunade _anything_ like Naruto's bitch. I tried to give her some talk-back fire, but the scene only worked out if she was a little scared.


	5. Demanding

Flails. This is early bc I won't be at home tomorrow.

Naruto thoughts: Underlined

 **Kurama thoughts: Underlined/ bold**

 **Kurama speak: Bold**

… _: At the same time, or a little while later._

 ** _Enjoy._**

* * *

"Ara? Yamato? No, I haven't seen him," Sakura replied to Sasuke, "but I could help you find him. I'm pretty sure I know where he is at this time."

"What can't you just tell me," Sasuke grouched, and Sakura pouted.

"It won't be so bad, taking a walk together," Sakura ignored him, "Its been a long while since we've done that. Besides, I don't think Yamato-sensei would see you without me."

Sasuke doubted that was true, but followed after her after she had put away her working paraphernalia. They didn't say much to each other; wouldn't. It was strained between them, like it was between Sasuke and everyone else in the village. The only difference was that Sakura was still trying to get to him. They couldn't talk together, Sasuke knew, because they never had before. Sakura was the upfront type of pushy. Sasuke liked to force his opponent's hand behind the scenes.

"Hey Sakura," someone called.

"Good morning, Sakura," another greeted.

"Hello, good morning," she smiled back, and Sasuke wondered where she had gotten the soft temperament from, "Have you gotten the new flowers yet? Ah, I hope you catch the morning flow, Gerobe!"

"'Thank you, I'm just opening the shop now," an older man replied. Sasuke simply looked at everything in the village as he walked by. Nothing had changed; not even slightly. Only the people were different; slightly taller or older or with a new scar on them. There was something about it that put ease in Sasuke, after years of being alone. To himself, he denied this even though the small, quiet, most truthful part of his mind made his body warm with the emotion.

"Ah, Sakura," Kiba called as he was walking by, Akamaru by his elbow, "going to see Tsunade-sama?"

"No. I have to catch Yamato-taichou. Why? Did she send for me?"

Kiba shook his head and replied, "I just assumed. Anyway, when I last saw him, he was going to see Kakashi, since he just got back."

"Ah, ah. I figured," Sakura said in a way that seemed like she was talking to herself, "Alright, thanks, Kiba-kun."

"No problem," he nodded, and Akamaru barked down below. Sasuke didn't miss the way that Kiba's eyes glanced and narrowed at him for a split second. He also saw the way that Akamaru shifted; not sure whether to attack or simply stand ready. It would have been useless anyway. Akamaru was still more of a wild animal than Sasuke.

They parted ways, and Sasuke followed behind a continuously greeted Sakura. Something about it was adult. Something like, "Now that they were grownups, more people knew them." Which didn't make any sense, because people had always known who he was.

"Che," Sakura snorted from right beside him, face twisted with feigned amusement for a moment. She glanced at him, and Sasuke took the bait. It was better than being led around like a dog.

"What?"

"You're thinking of how important you are. You've got that look on your face," Sakura said, and laughed to herself. They walked in silence for long moments more. When they turned down a street that no one walked on, she continued.

"I used to think it too. That you were important. But the child version of me- who had no hard work to her name except studying- and this version of me- who has had the snot kicked out of me day by day by one of the strongest shinobi to exist- are very different. I'm just glad I can see everything properly now," she ranted, and then took a sharp turn that left Sasuke feeling lost. There was a long, intense silence in which Sasuke realized that there was nothing left to say.

"Kakashi-sensei," Sakura called loudly. Sasuke looked over her shoulder, to find Kakashi and who he assumed was Yamato, sitting on the front steps of a rather old looking building.

"Sakura, Sasuke," the gray haired man greeted back, "something you need?"

"Yamato... taicho," Sasuke said, slow to add an honorific to someone he didn't care about, "Tsunade-sama wishes to see you. And you're to bring Naruto with you."

"Ara? Another mission already? Oh well," he said, pushing himself up and stretching himself out. Sasuke had already turned to leave.

"Have you seen Naruto, Sakura," Kakashi asked.

"Not lately. But I'm going to have to go with Yamato to catch him. There's some medical stuff that I need to have a word with him about," Sakura said absently. Kakashi raised an eyebrow at her, and thought she might murder the young man should she get her hands on him. Naruto and medical news were never a good combination.

"Well, we'd better go," Yamato said, and bid farewell to Kakashi.

The lazy jounin waved an arm and said, "Ah wait. I think I'll come along."

Sakura raised her eyebrows but did not reply. Yamato murmured something in approval.

 ** _…_**

"Who said they had the right," Naruto growled to himself as he paced. The training grounds were barren, save a few posts and himself. He threw himself angrily at a training post, kicking hard enough to send a chunk of splinters flying. He kicked it twice more before he seemed to decide that it wasn't enough.

He pulled his weapons from his various pockets and creases and began a dance around the various posts. His fury brought him to move faster, throw harder, aim with better precision, but it did not help. He knew how good he was at this- how he had trained himself and how he was constantly bettering everything he could do. It made him more furious.

"Trying to help me," he screamed at no one as he spun in a circle, "You could destroy everything!"

He began stomping as hard he could around the grounds, making the earth shake with the force and fury. He snarled at nothing in particular. He was frustrated. How was he supposed to properly release his anger with these obstacles in his way? What he really wanted was to fight Tsunade herself. Or better yet, to go to Suna right that instant and have a battle between himself and Gaara.

The thought made the anger settle in the middle of his chest with charging satisfaction. His eyes rolled, and his neck and shoulders mimicked.

" _Rasengan."_

His chakra rolled up into a ball in his fist. Tunnels of energy flew to him and curled and waved, and he growled to himself for a moment. His body took two steps under the weight of his own power, before he grew accustomed. Then he was zooming at the training post he had previously been beating down. With a final twist and a hop, Naruto was attacking the post in the oddest angle imaginable. From where his jutsu hit the post, it began to crack, until finally it was disintegrating in splinters of wood.

Naruto breathed in through his nose as the last of the damage was done. He breathed out, and felt a good part of his anger run away. Yet there was still enough inside of him for him to feel his skin crawl, his neck roll, and he screamed, "You can't just fucking decide-..!"

He slammed his fist into the post closest to him, leaving the wood broken, and his skin of his fist in similar condition. He snarled to himself, and then froze for a very long moment. It was not as though his anger had died down. Quite the contrary, his anger grew so forceful the he found and inability to release it for a long time. Slowly, very slowly, the young man opened his stance and raised his arms. He took a deep breath once more and made a motion as if drawing a bow. Chakra began swirling around his hands, until Naruto was practically holding a storm between his fists. It took the shape of a bow and arrow.

With one last angry growl, the ninja said, _"Rasenya."_

With a thunderous _crack_ , Naruto let go of the draw, and the arrow flew out of his hands and straight at a tree on the far end of the grounds. There was a powerful impact- a layer of dust unsettled from the ground and swept the training area. Then the tree was turning into splinters so small that it might as well have been dust. The leaves all burst away and fell down at once.

Upon seeing the destruction, Naruto felt an immediate sense of both relief and horror. His fingers tingled with power, and he hated it. In silence, he stared at the pile of tree dust the lay were the tree had been.

"Naruto," a whisper called. Naruto froze and clenched his fist together. That voice sounded like - no. It was not who he thought it was. He turned sharply and began walking in the most sedate pace he could toward it. He acted as though he had not just vaporized a tree.

"Hit-chan," he replied, and the girl materialized from somewhere in the shower. He was caught between pride and fear that she still knew how to do that. Pride, because he had taught her how to be a ferociously skilled shinobi, and fear, because the pride that he had taught her how to be a killer was too vast.

"I wanted to do something with you today... but you're not okay," she said in a small voice, eyes not even daring to flash at the evaporated tree. Naruto smiled at her, but they both knew it was not up to par. Her face blank and attention acute, pointed at him accusingly, as if she knew the fact well.

"I'm fine. Just a little vexed by a few things," he replied.

"A few great things," she said, raising her eyebrow in an all knowing gesture. Naruto shook his head and rubbed the back of his neck.

"Right. Right... I'm sorry. We can do something. I'll get you later today, if you want. I'll bring Sai so-"

"No," she said in a way that had the hairs on his back raising in suspicion, "I'll find you."

And she was gone like a shadow at new moon midnight.

"Naruto!"

Naruto looked over his shoulder, only to find Yamato, Kakashi, and Sakura headed toward him. He sighed. It had not been two minutes. Could he have more than that to think before he had to shut himself down?

"Ara, what's the matter," he said, looking concernedly at all three of them. From somewhere on the side of the field, Kurama bounded up. They all kept glancing behind him at the piles of sawdust and leaves. Kakashi and Yamato shared a look. Naruto ignored it resolutely.

 **Interesting attitude you've got there, gaki.**

I don't have to explain my anger to someone like _you._

 **Haha! We're just the same, you and I. What great things we could do if only you would let me-**

"Nothing's the matter, we just," Yamato's voice trailed off as Naruto's face twitched in annoyance.

Control me? You've got the mind of a child, to dream like that.

"Naruto! What did I tell you about your check-ups at the hospital," Sakura shouted at him. He twitched in mock chagrin and looked up at her through his eyelashes.

"Ara, Sakura," he whined, "I feel fine, there's no point! I can't waste all my time in the hospital! I have to be stronger to become Hokage."

"No point," Sakura's eyes flashed, "You imbecile! Even if you _do_ heal faster than normal people, it doesn't mean you're invulnerable!"

 **This... girl thing is pissing me off.**

Cool it before I cool it for you.

The kyuubi's tail flicked aggressively, but he didn't move from his position.

"It's fine, fine! Besides, Baa-chan checked me out before, so I should be okay right? I mean, she was your teacher, so it should be okay," he tried to sweet talk her.

"Why you- Naruto!"

Kurama raised himself onto his haunches and growled angrily at her. Sakura stumbled. Naruto looked down at the fox, face something like impassive. He leaned down and put his hand out.

Come here.

 **I could take a bite of her flesh.**

Don't make me pull you.

The fox skittered to him and up around his shoulders.

Thank you.

 **Whatever.**

"Sorry, Sakura-chan. He gets a little worked up when he's hungry."

"Naruto, Tsunade-sama has asked for us at the assignment desk," Yamato said, and Naruto grinned, even though he felt wicked inside.

"Finally! I've been dying to get out!"

 **I could make that literal.**

You could try.

 _ **~{UN}~**_

When the sun was half cut off by the edge of the horizon and bled the sky into an orange and red mess, Naruto finally said, "Come out here, Sai."

The anbu popped up immediately, walked with an ease, as if he had not just been spying on Naruto. Naruto, who was not doing anything but sitting in the field with Kurama. He was waiting for his sister to come out. She said she would 'find him,' but he had expected her to do so much earlier. Even though he had met her many times after the sun had gone down, there were times when he did not want to see her by the light of the moon. Sometimes he just wanted to walk around, while the sun kept him hot, and go to the places she liked to be.

"What are you doing," Sai asked.

"Waiting," Naruto said, and didn't give him anything else to work with. Kurama whipped his tail back and forth in something like aggravation.

 **Can't these humans find something interesting to do with their own lives.**

I am the interesting thing.

 **Don't make it sound as if you're such a hot commodity. I know these people don't like you.**

Ah, but they don't like me enough to want to be around me all of the time. Watching me and checking to see if my temper hasn't risen. To make sure you're nowhere in sight.

 **Oh, if only they knew.**

The human being is an intelligent animal. But in groups they're nothing more than school of goldfish. Three second attention span, and they run when they think it's dangerous.

 **Swim, you mean?**

Smartass.

"You haven't got any friends to wait with," Sai asked or said. Naruto gave him a frosty smile.

"Oh, but my pet is here," he replied, "and I'm guessing he came to entertain me."

 **Really, you're more like me than you realize.**

Hmmm.

Sai didn't take that fake, unimpressive smile from his face. Naruto didn't seem to mind. Instead, he leaned himself back into the grass. Naruto would never get over how much of the earth was his to feel and appreciate. When not tasked with the trivialities of a shinobi, Naruto thought there was nothing more in the world he liked doing than living.

"What are you waiting for," Sai leaned all over Naruto's peacefulness, and he became irritated quickly.

"Naruto-nii," Hitori said from her place of materialization above his head. Naruto felt an excited thrill run up the back of his neck. He felt disappointed immediately afterward.

"Hit-chan," he greeted, and stood up, and Kurama skittered around his legs before taking off.

Remember to come home tonight. And don't bite anyone.

 **Whatever, human.**

Naruto felt somewhere between pleased and annoyed. He leaned over to caress his sister's cheek in greeting. She looked up at him, her face blank, but her eyes full of disdain. She said, "What did you do today?"

Naruto paused, watching the look in her eyes, and knowing she knew the truth. He sighed. Sai answered for him, "He was in the Hokage's office, receiving a mission, I think."

As suddenly as a fire sparked to life, Hitori's eyes were on him, blazing and furious in their own way, though the rest of her body was cold. She gave him a vicious look, and Naruto knew well that it was much less to intimidate him than it was to make him a promise. If she could lay hands on him, she would end his life painfully.

"A mission, you think," she said in quiet, cold fury. Naruto loved and hated it when she got angry about his missions. He thought she hated to see him go for such periods of time, and never know when he would be back. At the same time, he knew she was jealous, because he kept her from becoming a ninja as well, and it suited him just fine. Not her.

"I have business in Suna," Naruto replied.

"Business," she spat, "And that's why you're here too, isn't it? You've got business here, with me, so you've decided to come back, and stay for a while?"

"Jin- Hitori," Naruto slipped, "You're not business, you know that-"

"Fuck what I know," the young woman finally spat, "Nothing can ever keep you in one place can it? Not me or anything. And just as well, you won't let me become a ninja either; you want to tie down everything you own and keep it unhappy."

"I don't own you," Naruto growled.

"Like fuck you don't," Hitori said, eyes glistening with anger, and Naruto felt floored by her accusations.

"I don't own you, and I never will," Naruto fumed, "And you're not business. You know that you've always been my top priority, no matter what I'm doing."

"I know that? And how have I had a chance to learn all these things, with the way you treat me? If you don't own me, then tell me I can become a ninja- tell me I can fight for my village again."

Naruto was silent for long moments; an admission of guilt more than anything he could have said. Hitori's face twisted in a vicious way that it did when he was right, and he said, "You can do whatever you want."

Hitori grinned, but the look of it was unkind. Naruto held in his flinch, but knew it was too late. Hitori replied, "Yeah. Yeah right. Have fun with your business, _Aniue_. I'll be here when you get back. Just like always."


	6. Kiss Indirectly

So I've had a billion different renditions of Hitori Uzumaki since I began writing this (several years ago.) This time, I finally decided what to do with her- she's going to be my self-centered, spoiled girl, with a brother complex.

* * *

It was fair to say that Naruto had been brooding. And not just any kind of brooding. Naruto was doing the full scale, days of preparation before initiation, dark and deep brooding.

Initially, the blonde would stop in the middle of his sentences during a conversation with someone. His eyes became unfocused, and he looked to be in deep thought. Some people just thought Naruto's attention span was shortening. Until he stopped replying to people altogether. He'd simply give them a blank look, as if they were a lamp post he was considering, and walk away.

Then came the looks of annoyance. Whenever someone would call him, or ask for his attention, Naruto would turn to them, face a dark stew of thought. When he laid his eyes on that person, his face would contort into something disgusted or annoyed, and he would disappear without a word. The same could be said the day that he was to leave for his mission.

Naruto leaned against the gates of the city, eyes a dark mass filled with thought. It wasn't odd for Naruto to have thoughts, nor was it odd to see him pondering something. However, the intensity with which Naruto's eyes focused and unfocused, and the deep set to his lips made the sight unnerving.

Yamato-taicho was the first to arrive next to Naruto, and upon seeing the look on his face, wondered whether he should worry about an attack against Konoha, worry about the man himself, or not say anything at all.

"Naruto... Are you prepared? The mission will begin soon," Yamato-taicho finally decided, because that was as neutral of all things as it could possibly be in his mind. Yet, as the blonde turned to him, he could tell that his eyes had turned vicious and demeaning, as if Yamato had was simply a grade school student learning his ABC's. Naruto said nothing, and his eyes grew unfocused again.

There was an unsettling of the breeze, and suddenly Hinata and Sasuke appeared. It was a testament to how unfocused Naruto was, that he didn't start a beef with the Uchiha as soon as he saw him. Almost everyone knew that Naruto was rallying the hardest for Sasuke to be demoted from being a ninja, or at least from going on semi-important missions. That Naruto did not even acknowledge his presence meant that something was awry.

"N-Naruto... -kun," Hinata called him. It did not initially get his attention, but when she stepped into his personal space, and put hand to his cheek, Naruto snapped into an awareness that contrasted his behavior for the last several days. His eyes, now losing their sharpness, focused solely on Hinata. He furrowed his eyebrows at her, because smiling here would seem odd. Naruto, although unaware of how grave the faces he made were, knew that he wasn't 'acting like himself.'

"Sorry," he said, standing straight, and her hand slipped from his cheeks, "Are we ready?"

Yamato-taicho gave him a skeptical look once, before nodding slowly. As they prepared to take off, they were interrupted by the call of Naruto's name. He cringed.

Naruto knew that voice. Sure, it was a little higher than normal, but Naruto assumed that tone was taken in annoyance. She was probably still mad about their conversation, which Naruto had been brooding over.

"Naruto...- kun," Hitori called mockingly, and walked leisurely; as if they were not pressed for time, and could arrive in the Sunagakura at any point. When she got to him, she put her hands on his arms, and smoothed out the wrinkles there. Then she zipped his jacket up the rest of the way. Naruto could do nothing but stand in shocked silence.

"Hi-," he put a hoarseness into his voice that people always assumed was for some shocked or angry moment in his emotions. Technically, he was both of those things. Somehow, the way she had talked to him the other day was still grating on his nerves. He wanted to shout at her; to tell her he didn't control her. He wanted to follow her around and show her the force of his anger, and at the same time he wanted her to go away and not come back.

"Naruto,"she smiled, and it was vindictive and happy all at once. She wrapped her fingers, long and thin, around the back of his neck, and pulled him down. Surprise caught Naruto's face before her lips did, and then he was frozen with befuddlement. Her lips on his cheek, warm and cool at the same time, soft and cracked in some spots, was not a feeling he was at all used to. In fact, he had never experienced that, for all of the years he'd lived. When she let him go, he could tell his eyes were wide. He lifted his hand to where she had kissed him, pressing his fingertips into the skin outlining the mark her lips had left on him. He felt burned and taken care of all at once.

 **For your sister, this girl sure does do a lot of non-sibling-like things.**

Hitori, looking content to have riled him up, and still very cross with him, smiled and said, "You told me I could do whatever I wanted."

Without another word, the girl was blank space and a flurry of the greenest leaves. Naruto felt alone and smothered at the same time. Still pressing his fingers to his cheek, he told the others, "Let's go."

And he too was nothing but blank space.

 **…**

"We should stop here," Yamato-taicho said, because the forest floor was already turned a deep acorn color by the last of the sun's rays of light. Naruto knew, at that moment, that he should at least argue. They had another good half-hour to an hour they could make on that journey. It would mean they'd made significant progress if they made it to the grasslands just before the great dunes that marked the Wind Country's territory. Yet Naruto said nothing, and looked for all for all of the world like a confused young boy trying to discover the woes of love.

 **Ha punk. Your mind is a mess. You act as though you've never been kissed before.**

At the same time, Sasuke smirked, and said, "Baka, you've never been kissed by a girl?"

Naruto's face and neck turned a burning shade of red, and his hand touched the flesh on his cheek where he was kissed. He said, in a torn, ragged voice, "I'm going to collect firewood."

The blonde scrambled away, Kurama shuffling after him, his voice cackling away in his head.

"Shut up," Naruto growled angrily when he was sure enough that he had gotten a good distance away from his teammates.

 **Oh, the poor kit's never been kissed.**

The growling tenor of Kurama's voice made Naruto check their surroundings quickly with his eyes. An image of his accidental kiss with Sasuke flashed through his mind. He gave his fox pet a glare.

"So what if I haven't?"

The fox cackled madly and Naruto made a snarling noise into the air that was far more vicious than he meant it to be. If he ever thought back on this, the young shinobi might have thought this all a farce. As it stood, his thoughts echoes with his sister's last words to him.

" _You told me I could do whatever I wanted."_

He had, he _had,_ but-... Deep down, Naruto knew he was a self-centered brother. He was thinking about nothing but what he wanted when it came to his sister. He would protect her, even when she didn't need protecting. And that meant that she was never to become a shinobi again. Naruto had seen what that life had done to them. Shit, he'd lived the life along side her.

Naruto had chosen to go to Konoha Gakuen because he wanted to give her a better future. He wanted to become Hokage for her- so that she would know unbridled peace. It was a long, slow, and painful journey, what with him holding back, but he'd do anything for her.

He'd already done many things for her.

Just about everything.

Except-

Naruto's ears grew hot when he remembered the gentle press of lips next to his. He wasn't even sure how flesh could _be_ that soft. There was nothing on Naruto that soft, except for his...Well, he'd never touched anyone with _that;_ that was for sure.

How could she just..? Naruto knew she was simply teasing him, but did it have to be with that? He closed his eyes and thought of her face afterward, the warm light of the sun spilling into her collarbone and the sharpness of the gold in her eyes. As the young shinobi laughed to himself and began doing his duty, he thought, of course, it had to have been a kiss. Oh, how he loved that girl.

Now if only he could go on smothering her.

 _ **~{sng}~**_

Suna was as hot and dry as Naruto remembered it, and held just about all of the comfort as it had last time he was here. As soon as the sun was at its height in the sky, the burning sand from displaced dunes scorched his cheeks, and he saw Suna's gates, the dilemma of his sister pressed into the back of his mind. While it didn't disappear, it sank away, and Naruto felt relief. Kurama's presence poked curiously around in his mind, trying to find something Naruto was unsure he could give him.

 **What did you do?**

What are you talking about?

 **It feels like you just put a cold, fuzzy blanket on my mind.**

It's an emotional reaction. I don't know how often you have those, but right now, what you're feeling is relief.

 **Oh shut up, you sentimentally overripe guinea pig.**

Naruto decided at the moment that he was not going to continue to argue with the tailed beast if he were to go on feeling this relief. As it was, he could already feel the anger he'd forgotten about seep up into him in reaction to Kurama's feelings. His chest crackled, and he tried to balance the feelings of relief and outrage, only to come up with something hot and bubbly in his chest. Kurama hissed at the edge of his mind.

 **That's it.**

Naruto ignored him as he passed into the gates of Suna. He was angry at Gaara, not the city, and if he let himself out of control, there was no telling how much trouble he'd get into. Naruto took in a deep calming breath of the arid wind, and felt all his muscles relax. He was gong to be angry, and he _was_ going to release his fury, but only the way he wanted to. He would not let it control him.

 **Oh, but I miss it.**

 _Shut up._

The anger in Naruto's body coalesced, curdled, and hardened in his stomach. He would do nothing until he got an explanation from Gaara's mouth. And them maybe he would kick his teeth in.

The gates of Suna were much more imposing than the ones of Konoha, probably because Suna's walls were so high. They swung inwards faster than Naruto expected them, but he wondered why he was so damned surprised each and every time. He'd been here often enough to remember that, or at least not be surprised by it.

"Yo! Naruto," someone butchered his name in a slurred voice, the way he hated. No doubt it was Kankuro.

"Yo! Kana-chan," he laughed. The burly man scowled at him through his mop of hair, pointing an affronted finger.

"Don't call me that, butt face!"

"Oi, who you calling a butt face, you mountain monkey!"

"Now boys," Temari came up to interrupt their conversation, "you're both as cute as a blubbering whalefish's ass. Now quit your sorry argument before I make you."

"Geez," Naruto huffed.

"Nice to meet you, Temari-san," Yamato greeted, seeming obviously pleased by her brash attitude, but still keeping an eye on Naruto. His pensiveness has seemed to disappear altogether upon reaching Suna, but he would be on his guard. Kankuro's eye caught the bundle resting across Naruto's shoulders.

"Who's that runt," he inquired. Said runt sprang to life, arching and hissing as if a cat. Naruto let out an amused laugh.

Be calm.

 **Be calm my asshole. I'll eat this runt alive.**

He doesn't know you're thousands of years old and suck human souls like soup. Just let him be.

… **hmph. Lucky you know your place.**

... Right.

"This is Kyu-chan? Aren't you jealous because he's cuter than you, Kana-chan?"

"Why you," Kankuro started after him

 **Cute!?**

His elder sister rolled his eyes as he practically leaped on the blonde. She pulled them apart, motioned for the rest of Team Seven to follow and said, "We really appreciate this. We're a little short handed right now, and we're glad you guys could come."

"Do you know anything about the mission," Yamato-taicho asked. Temari sighed, glancing at her brother dragging Naruto by the neck.

"We're having a bit of trouble on the border of the Land of Earth," she admitted, "Gaara will explain the whole thing to you. It's kind of troublesome."

Naruto raised his eyebrows and smiled to himself, pleased that he knew exactly whom the kunoichi would end up with, despite the distance separating them.

"Isn't everything," Yamato-taicho sighed.

"I hope this goes over quickly," Naruto said loudly, "I'm really hungry for that ramen shop near Tosen."

"I'm sure it won't. Gaara will be pleased to see you again," Temari said. Something dark rolled within Naruto's stomach.

"I bet he will," Naruto growled under his breath.

 **…**

The tension in the room was palpable. Naruto wanted to fly across the desk and give Gaara a piece of his mind. Naruto's problem wasn't that Gaara was interfering with his life. It hadn't been the first time, since he had met the young Kazekage.

His _problem_ was the Gaara was jeopardizing the safety of his sister. And now that she was on the rise to become a ninja, it would take a lot to coerce her back into hiding. _If_ he could coerce her. Naruto didn't want to have to resort to the nastier ideas floating around in his head.

Paralysis was one.

 **You're fucking vicious.**

Only for those I care about.

 **Is that what you call care, kit?**

Don't call me that, or it will be you I handicap.

 **I dare you, kit.**

Temari had been right about one thing- Gaara had been keen on seeing Naruto. Unfortunately, because Naruto had not been as keen on seeing him, or at least, not keen for the same reasons, they had reached a stalemate. After a few minutes of greetings and then Kazekage preparing himself, they had settled into an uncomfortable atmosphere in which Naruto was forced to act light-hearted and still try to portray his anger to Gaara. It was not difficult in the slightest. His eyes could kill.

So angry was he at the red head that he missed the whole first half of their mission description. It was a testament to his memory that he caught the tail end of the Kazekage's last few sentences. It sounded like a set up.

"So why did we have to come here first, if it was a mission for them," Sasuke asked Naruto's thoughts, and Gaara's eyes flashed to him for no more than a few seconds before he was looking at Naruto. The blonde's gaze was unrelenting and vicious, but he didn't say anything. There was something more that the red head was going to ask Naruto to do. Gaara began to explain himself.

"Technically, this is a mission given to the Sunagakure ninja. The people of the village couldn't afford to send a message to Konohagakura, nor hire you."

"So you're covering the cost," Yamato-taicho said, "Very noble."

"Nothing to do with nobility," Gaara said, "everything to do with responsibility. As in the words of Baki."

"He's right," Yamato-taicho said.

"Doesn't mean I can stop him from saying it," Gaara said under his breath, "You'll be leaving from here in a couple of days, and your only job will be to stay with the workers until the next group comes to relieve you."

"Next group?"

"Yes. A group from Iwagakure will be escorting them out," Gaara replied. There was obviously a bigger reason why ninja from Konoha, and not ninja from Iwa or Ame, or even Suna were escorting these people. Naruto didn't want to interfere with personal matters, and he wouldn't. He was only here to resolve one thing.

"Alright," he crowed, "that means we get to take a break here. There was this ramen shop that we passed on the way here that I've gotta try!"

Yamato-taicho groaned, and Naruto earned a look of knowing camaraderie from Gaara. It wasn't, however, what the blonde was in the mood for. Instead, he sent a fleetingly scathing look back at Gaara.

"Hey Gaara, you must be pretty powerful now, as the Kazekage and all," he laughed, "You should take a break from all that leader business and spar with me!"

"Naruto," Yamato-taicho began to admonish, "you can't go around challenging political leaders like that..."

"I will think on it," Gaara said, contradicting Yamato-taicho with a flash in his eyes that said he was ready for the challenge. He was ready to go against Naruto's anger at him. But Naruto didn't think he was ready enough. Oh no. Gaara was probably the only person on the face of the planet, besides his sister, who had any image of how powerful Naruto's anger could be. He also knew when Naruto was being murderously serious.

"Great," he grinned, "But it has to wait until after lunch. I'm staaarving!"

 ** _…_**

"Why would you do that," Naruto asked when he and Gaara were alone together, the blonde treating the Kazekage to lunch. Gaara swallowed his bite of eel and gave Naruto a level look.

Finally he replied with, "It was simply a suggestion."

"A suggestion," Naruto hissed, "Did you ply her with drinks and then place a bet on it? Tsunade isn't likely to take a suggestion from Jiraiya the Sage, her best friend for years and years, no less a leader of another nation."

Gaara's face didn't change one bit, damn him, making Naruto feel as though his admonishment wasn't getting through at all.

"It was a suggestion. She must have made the decision on her own."

"Made the-..! I... do **not** want to _become a jounin_ ," Naruto hissed, "And no one seems to want to ask me what I want. It is _not_ my time yet. I have _not_ yet plied the entirety of the village to my side, and I have too many faces to be worried about for you to be interfering with my business."

"You're a killer," Gaara said abruptly, placing his cup down none too gently and staring Naruto in the eyes, "And you're playing at being some ignorant fool who's going to die just to keep the facade. Your _business_ is to kill... whenever and for whoever you have to."

Fury welled up inside Naruto so hot that he was surprised the cup in his hands didn't explode.

"Fight me," he said, malicious scowl spreading over his features as he slowly unclenched his fist from his eating utensils.

"Getting into a fight with a nin from the allied town wouldn't look good," Gaara's stare was piercing, "for either of us."

"Y'know, somehow I don't think anyone from this village would mind two old friends getting into a tussle. And I think you should have thought of that before you began to meddle in my affairs," Naruto snarled, "Let's make a deal. If you win this duel, I will become a jounin and... I'll take a mission from you, however long I have to stay in Suna to do it."

Gaara's eyes glinted, and his fingers grew lax around his chopsticks. Naruto knew he had his attention then. He smiled coldly.

"But if I win... _never_ try anything like this again. In fact," Naruto said thoughtfully, as if the idea had just occurred to him, "I don't want to hear from you at all, for the next two years. Or until I send word that you may."

Gaara looked down at his plate of food. Slowly, he started up eating again, and Naruto knew that he was considering the wager. Bet or not, Naruto was going to have his revenge on Gaara with his fists. Nartuo drank down the rest of his miso soup and ate his last few strips of beef.

"I accept," Gaara said when he was done, the darkness of being a jinchuuriki residing deep within his eyes. Naruto felt fury curl his lips up- felt his mask sliding and his emotions falling out of his eyes. He was more tired than he planned on being, so he'd have to be less reckless than he thought he could be during this fight. Ever since he got word that the Kazekage was interfering with his life, Naruto had just not been meditating right.

It was the only form of rest he could get, and since everything important to him had just about been fucked, he needed this to settle his mind. His body felt tense and slightly strained from the constant movement he and his chakra had been in. Still, it wasn't the worst thing Naruto had ever been through, so he was sure he could fight Gaara through this.

"Then let's go," Naruto said, leaving a generous amount of currency on the table and sliding to his feet. The Kazekage followed suite, tipping his hat down, and heading out of the establishment. It was quite a thing to realize that he was always the first to be leaving some place, with others following him. Still, Naruto would not be following him for much longer if the fight went as well as it could. He usually made sure to keep his fighting style weak and unassuming if he could, only bringing out the lethal or powerful methods during a fight worth the practice. Naruto thought this fight was worth the outcome.

 **Ah, you're going to fight another jinchuuriki** **?** **This should be delicious.**

Go back to the room.

 **And miss this juicy piece of action; how could I?**

Get out of our way, or go back, kyuubi. I have no tolerance for you.

 **I am not something to be tolerated. I am a powerful demon, insolent child.**

You are only as powerful as I let you be. Shall I constrict you more, or shall you do as I say, and learn my generosity?

 **As though I need your** _ **generosity.**_

You won't know unless you do as I say.

 **...**

Kurama was skittering away from them them in a matter of seconds, calling Gaara's attention only briefly before he returned it to the duel he was about to have with Naruto. When they got to the training grounds, Naruto immediately took the opposite side of the field. Gaara took a slight stance and prepared for Naruto to attack. While he did, he unsnapped his Kazekage robes, leaving only the his tail coat and his pants behind. It would be too heavy to carry, and he knew for a fact that the blonde was faster then him when it came to taijutsu.

Naruto, who was on the other side of the grounds, took a deep breath and prepared himself to attack. Naruto was debating how much control he had over his Water Style jutsu when Gaara attacked. It threw him- he knew the red head to be a defensive opponent. It wasn't a matter; bullets of sand had Naruto dodging and assuming the young Kazekage to be a long range attacker. He didn't underestimate the speed of Gaara's defense, however. Without a second thought, Naruto dug his feet into the ground and launched himself through the hail of sand. He zipped through, being sure to balance his chakra before slamming into the defense Gaara had already brought up.

Dormant or not, Shukaku was the ultimate defense mechanism. And as much as Naruto appreciated that most of the time, now was not one of those moments. Using the chakra he had amassed in his arm, Naruto swung against the barrier once more, using blast of wind as his buffer so the skin of his knuckles wouldn't break. It also created a pleasing dent in the sand, although Naruto knew for a fact that wouldn't be enough.

Gaara had encountered many fighting styles before he eventually made it to becoming Kazekage. Naruto, however, was not someone he had fought more than once. He was acutely aware that the young genin wasn't as weak as he seemed. Which was one of the reasons he wanted to Naruto to become a jounin. His other reason was much more devious.

The dent in his sand gave him no discomfort. He knew Naruto would try to turn the battle into a close range one. It was a style Gaara had been working on, and he wouldn't let Naruto win so easily. He swiftly clamped his sand down on Naruto's hand, staring up at the shinobi through the gaps in his sand shield. Naruto's eyes were cold. His face was vicious. The blonde swung his leg into the dent. Unfortunately for Gaara, his sand shield wasn't particularly strong when it was in the process of forming. The blast of wind Naruto added to his strike sent Gaara flying.

The Kazekage recuperated faster than Naruto anticipated, but not fast enough to keep from another striking blow. This time he did not put any chakra behind his fist as he pushed it through Gaara's still weak sand-barrier. The Kazekage swung away, but was clipped. Naruto was pleased to feel one of the jinchuuriki's ribs shift dangerously under his fist. His redirected fist blew up sand and debris from the ground, and his intent to kill heightened by several degrees. They had just begun.

 ** _..._**

Viciousness tore at Naruto's heart as he gathered chakra to preform a water style jutsu. At this point, he was no longer angry at Gaara. He simply wished the other could understand. He didn't like people interfering with his plans. He didn't like them interfering with his emotions. His need to tear into Gaara ferociously grew, and he Naruto winced with the weight of the pain bearing down on him, but he wasn't done yet. He _couldn't_ be done yet.

He'd only succeeded in spraining his ankle- which would require a quick heal- and not at all at beating the man who'd messed with his life senseless. Looking at the red head, he was pleased- his body was suffering a bit of chakra exhaustion, he had a deep gash in his right leg, and beneath his fingers, his neck bled out. Naruto had been careful for that one. He didn't have any intention of killing the Kazekage. Yet.

"Naruto, enough," Yamato-taicho called to him, and he debated heeding his team-leader's call, or continuing on. Gaara dropped his stance and rolled his shoulders.

"Shall we call it a truce," his deep voice carried over. A vicious rage burned a hole in his stomach and sent acid through his veins. He was glad Yamato-taicho was behind him, because he could see- though it was slight- the reaction to him in Gaara's eyes. His only give away was the sharp spike in his killing intent, which he stifled and snuffed almost at once. He paused, pushing all of his anger out of him and taking a deep breath. He nodded.

"Y-yeah... A truce this time," he replied, wary of how his anger would change his voice and Yamato-taicho standing not too far away. He felt Yamato-taicho's anxious energy go down great levels, but he still knew it was there. He relaxed his stance and balanced on his uninjured leg until he felt he could take a normal stance. Gaara swiped away blood from his injured leg and limped over.

"Kazekage-sama, do you need assistance heading to the hospital," Yamato-taicho asked. Gaara waved him off in dismissal. He slugged an unordinarily friendly arm around Naruto, who pushed his shoulder under his friend's and wrapped an arm around his waist. "Naruto will help," he said with a tone of finality and Naruto nodded at his leader.

"S'my fault anyway," he grumbled under pretenses, and they meandered away, both having no intention of going to the hospital. A meaningful glance from the Kazekage bade Yamato-taicho not follow them.

 ** _…_**

"I sincerely apologize," Gaara said as they hobbled to their destination. They were close, but didn't slow up for fear of straining their already torn, bleeding, and burning bodies. Naruto inclined his head to acknowledge that he had heard the apology, but didn't exactly accept it. Sabaku no Gaara didn't expect him to. He had been sure since the moment Naruto had stepped into his office that he'd have to apologize profusely. "I missed you," Gaara finally said as Naruto was lying him in the grass of their city's Greenhouse Garden.

Technically, they only used it to produce herbs and other plants for medicinal purposes. Back when Naruto had been on a short visit, they'd made it their own. It was here that they could speak freely with one another. Naruto's eyes caught Gaara's, and he felt his cheeks grow ruddy in embarrassment. He was already flushed from their fight- and traveling in the sun in such inappropriate garments- but knew that Gaara would notice. The look in his eyes said that he did notice, but didn't say anything about it.

"I sincerely apologize," he repeated, "and also for what I said about being a killer. That was... too much. But I was... frustrated because I did not think you would understand my need to see you."

"What you _suggested_ could have endangered my loved ones. It would have made it hard for me to keep my power hidden."

"Why would you want to do that," Gaara said, sitting up to watch Naruto heal his leg. Blue eyes flashed up at him for a breifest moment before they were back on his leg. He hissed in pain as the skin sewed itself back together more rapidly than usual.

"Because people _already_ fear me, and I haven't shown myself to be capable in most skills. Its not smart to flaunt power when they have people following me around. If it were just me, I'd not be so upset, although I _still_ would have been angry with you," he glared balefully at Gaara as his fingers brushed the wound on his neck, and it closed. The red head merely winced and stared up into his eyes. They stay that way for a long time. Naruto's fingers brushing Gaara's neck, uncovered by his sand-barrier. His skin was milky and debilitating in its attractiveness to the blonde. He idly thought of whoever would get to enjoy this skin, and even more idly wondered what it would be like to be that person.

"I missed you," Gaara said again, this time so quiet that Naruto had to realize how close they were. He looked away from Gaara's eyes, and found purchase in the valley of his collarbone. He licked his lips without thought.

"I missed you too," he croaked. If he were to be completely honest with himself, Naruto was a complete softy when it came to Gaara. More than his best friend, he was the _only_ friend that Naruto had that understood his calm and brooding ways. They had gone through the same measure of loneliness. Gaara was feared for being hateful, which only made him more so. Naruto was feared for what he hid inside himself, and so hid even more. And although they had only sent one another the occasional letter, and met a few times in the past few years, Naruto hadn't been more connected to anyone else. Yes, without fear of doubt, Gaara was absolutely Naruto's best friend on the face of the earth.

"I wanted to see you. I thought it would be a chance to bring us closer," Gaara admitted slowly, averting his eyes as he let out his thoughts unbidden. His fingers came to rest on the back of the blonde's hand still on his throat. Naruto's heart thundered in his chest at the thought of someone _wanting_ to see him. Wanting to be in his presence. The thought of being missed truly hit him, and he swallowed around a lump of happiness forming in his esophagus.

"You could have just sent me a letter. I would have requested more missions in the Kaze no Kuni without a second thought," he murmured, brushing his fingers across Gaara's already barely there scar. The Kazekage looked back at him, his eyes piercing and commanding and asking for something.

"I want," Gaara seemed to struggle with what he wanted to say, "I think... I want you."

"Want me," Naruto repeated, his vision blurring and darkening until all he could see was Gaara and his eyes, the way his lips twisted with unsureness, but his face stood purely blank. He moved Naruto's hand in his to his lips, and kissed the curve of his palm. Naruto pushed himself away quickly, heat blooming over his neck and ears. He swallowed, eyes wide as he looked down at where he had been kissed. After several long moments, he looked back up at a completely unsure Gaara, too far gone to wonder if he had offended or hurt him when he'd jumped away.

"You think you want me," Naruto asked in a croaking voice,"or do you know that you... that you have feelings for me, but are unsure of whether I'll accept them?"

Gaara's eyes slid to the floor and narrowed, as if it was the grass's fault that he wasn't brave enough. Naruto thought this had nothing to do with bravery, and everything to with too many past experiences of being shunned, and not enough experience with relationships.

"I... I don't know what to tell you," Naruto murmured, looking at the twitching fingers on the hand that Gaara had kissed.

"Do you... feel the same," Gaara asked, and Naruto felt his chest constrict so tightly that he thought he might have been having a heart attack. He took a deep breath, and then another. So many people had been _kissing_ him lately, and though it was natural for a human to have those kinds of connections, Naruto wasn't sure how to go about them. Instead of answering, he pressed his lips to the spot on his hands where he could still feel Gaara's kiss burning. He locked eyes with the red head for a few moments, his face and neck and chest burning, before he had to turn away, lest he drown in his embarrassment.

* * *

Yep, that was abrupt, but at least they didn't jump into a relationship right away.

Coming up: new characters, new revelations, new feelings, just new everything.

 _Until next time-_ _Lee._


End file.
